Hub City Underground

Let’s be honest, none of us wants to make a mess out of our lives.  None of us wants to get to the end of our life and look back with regret.  None of us want to get to the end of the year and look back with regret.  All of us want to get the most out of life.  All of us want to get the most out of our relationships, out of our finances, out of our jobs, out of our time.  Each of us wants to get to the end of our lives and have something worth looking back on.

But the problem is, if we’re honest, if we look at our lives, all of us live with some kind of regret.  We all live with some kind of baggage that we wish we could go back and change, that we wish we could go back and undo.

Well the goal of this series is to try and figure out a way that we might be able to foolproof our life.  To discover if there’s a way to live a life with little or no regret.  And we have said that the way to fool proof our life is to ask the best question ever about every decision, every opportunity, every invitation.  And we said that the best question ever is:  What is the wise thing to do?  In light of my past experience, in light of my current circumstance, in light of my future hopes and dreams, what is the wise thing to do?  That really is the best question ever.

Well, this morning I want to talk about what comes before you get to the best question ever.  Asking the best question ever is one thing, but before you get to the best question ever you need to make the best decision ever.  And this is really a principle that you might push back against at first, but I believe it’s a principle that we all follow on a daily basis so that we can get the most out of life.  The principle is this:  To make wise decisions I have to acknowledge and submit to the body of knowledge that allows me to make wise decisions.  Now let me explain that, in all of life there are laws or rules that govern how things work.  If you’re not aware of the rules or the laws it is impossible for you to make the wisest choice.  So, to make wise decisions each of us has to acknowledge and submit to the body of knowledge, the rules, the laws that allows us to make wise decisions.

Now, if you’re like me, when you hear the word “rules” a wall starts to go up.  I’m not a big rule person and I especially don’t like dumb rules.  You know what I’m talking about.  Dumb rules, stupid rules.  Rules that are useless and a waste of time:  Take your shoes off before you play on the playground in McDonalds (go ahead, get a fungus), I don’t like dumb rules.

But even though I don’t like dumb rules I am really a rule person.  I am a stickler about following the rules that aren’t dumb rules.  I know that makes me a subjective rule follower, but I think that we should follow good rules.  Don’t you?

But the interesting thing is that, no matter if you like rules, or laws or principles or not, each of us intentionally submits ourselves to rules, laws, principles on a regular basis because of the benefit that it brings us.  Let me illustrate it this way:

Each of the past 8 years, around March, I have taken all of my income statements to my accountant and I say, “Steve, here’s the stuff.  Prepare my tax return.”  And the reason I’ve given that stuff to Steve is because Steve knows the rules.  Steve knows the laws and Steve understands accounting.  And there are a lot of decisions that need to be made and I know that he will make those decisions better than me because the wisest decisions that are made in that context are made by people who understand tax rules and understand the boundaries.

I have renovated and re-roofed a number of houses in my life.  And when I’m in those situations I submit to the coordinators who are in charge because they understand, they know the codes.  They know how to put a roof on the right way.  They know what tools we need to use.  They know how the job should be done.  If I were to step in and start making suggestions they would probably throw me off the roof, because I don’t have training, I have no idea what I’m doing.  See, I differ to their judgment because the people who make the wisest decisions when it comes to construction are the people who understand the principles of construction.

These people are drawing from a body of knowledge that I don’t have.  They know the rules.  They know the limits.  They know the principles.  They understand the context in which they need to make decisions.

The same is true in medicine.  The same is true in art.  The same is true in music.  The same is true where you work.  You have the education or training so that you know the laws or rules, and as you draw from those you are able to make wise decisions in whatever area or arena that you work.

This is true in sports as well.  The people who are champions, the teams that win, are the teams that know the rules, the regulations, the options of their particular sport, so that they know what is best to do in whatever situation they are in so that they might possibly win.

It’s true in every arena of life.

Now the interesting thing about this principle, and we’re all impacted by it every single day in whatever we do and wherever we work and in whatever kind of family you have, the interesting thing about this is that knowing the limits and knowing the laws and knowing the rules of any particular arena or any job or wherever, does not make the decisions for you.  What it does is it narrows the scope of the decisions.  Simply knowing the rules, knowing the laws, understanding the contexts of any area, it doesn’t automatically make decisions for you, but what it does is it limits the options.  You know immediately what can and can’t be done.  You know that there aren’t ten options, there are only three options.  You know there are things where there’s no point in even trying because you know better than to try those things.

This is a principle that works for us or against us all the time.  Many of us, isn’t this true, have tried to make decisions without knowing the rules and the laws, and have paid for it, haven’t we?  Have you ever tried fixing your car or trying to fix a leaky pipe?  After trying to be the hero and failing miserably you go find a mechanic or a plumber because you realize you weren’t an expert and you realize that they know something that you don’t know.  There’s a body of knowledge, there’s some rules, some ideas, some principles that they are able to draw from that I don’t have.  So we say to other people, “You fix my car.  You repair my plumbing.  I’m going to trust you to make those decisions for me because you know the rules.”

There are always options in any of those arenas, but by understanding the principles, the laws, the rules of any arena you understand how many options there are and you know what things aren’t options.  Are you with me so far?  This is somewhat common sense.  These things impact our lives everyday.

Let’s take it one step farther.  It’s not just a matter of being aware of the rules, the laws, the limits in whatever discipline you work in or whatever field you work in.  Being aware of the rules, being aware of the principles is not enough.  What we do, even though we don’t use this word, in order to make wise decisions in any arena of life, not only are we aware of the principles and the values and the laws, but we submit ourselves to them.  When the surgeon walks in to the operating room to perform surgery, it’s not that he’s just aware of how the body works.  They’re not simply aware of how medicine works.  They’re not simply aware of how to do surgery.  They actually submit themselves to all that knowledge.  They submit themselves to those principles and rules, and by submitting themselves they are able to make a wise decision.  The same is true in fixing cars, the same is true in teaching, the same is true in engineering.  It’s not simply a matter of what we know, it’s a matter of are we willing to submit ourselves to what we know, to make decisions under the umbrella of that authority.  When we do that, our ability to make wise decisions is enhanced significantly.

Here’s what’s really puzzling to me.  That even though, every day of my life and every day of your life, we are constantly submitting ourselves to all kinds of authority and man made rules to get things done.  Even though most of us acknowledge that there’s a creator out there somewhere who’s given us the laws of physics and given us an understanding of how the body works.  Even though that happens every single day, all the time, there is still something in me as there is something in you that resists the notion of surrendering in total to the God who’s behind all of that.

In other words, there’s a God behind physics, there’s a God behind gravity, there’s a God who’s created the people who’ve created the systems that we follow.  And even though I’m willing to submit myself to many of those people, and even though I’m willing to follow the rules in all kinds of other areas.  When it comes down to it, that even though I believe there’s a God behind all of that, even though there’s a creator behind the creation, for some reason is it so hard for me to submit to his authority.  When it comes down to submitting to the one who created all of that, I resist.  There’s something that’s scary about saying, “I surrender all of my life to God and I’m going to submit to his authority.”

Think about it this way:  Whenever I go to a doctor I trust that the doctor to knows everything he or she could possibly know about the human body, that God created by the way.  I trust them to know the body inside and out.  I trust that they have explored and read up on and have been educated in all the latest techniques and how the body works and how certain medicines impact certain chemicals.  And I trust that when they’re telling me I need medicine that I am getting the best advice possible.  And as a result of trusting them, I am willing to submit myself to their counsel, their authority.  But at the same time I resist submitting myself to the counsel of the one who gives them counsel.  I resist submitting myself to the one that’s behind all that I’m submitting myself to when I come to them to fix me.

We’ll listen to our doctor, We’ll take all kinds of advice from a doctor, but when it comes to God telling us what we should do we resist, don’t we?

Is it any wonder that we make some of the dumb decisions that we make?  In other words, if there’s a God of all wisdom.  If there’s a God of creation.  If there’s a God who understands and knows the laws and the principles of life, not just medicine, not just business, not just law, not just art or music, but if there’s a God who knows, and who has created the rules and the principles and the context for all of life, and I am unwilling to acknowledge he is there and I am unwilling to submit to that body of knowledge that would inform my decisions and allow me to make wise decisions, is it any wonder that we do the dumb things that we do?  Is it any wonder that we get ourselves into trouble and say, “How did I get into this?”  Is it any wonder that we have regret?  Is it any wonder that we have guilt?

In all of life we understand this principle:  To make wise decisions I have to acknowledge and submit to the body of knowledge that allows me to make wise decisions.  But then when it comes to our lives and life in general, we ignore, we resist.  And we say to God, in so many terms, “Go ahead and do your own thing, but leave me alone.  I want to do what I want to do.  Granted, I need the wisdom of doctors, granted I need the wisdom of accountants, granted I need the wisdom of all these other people, but I don’t need your wisdom. Because I will call my own shots.  I will do my own thing.”

And what many of us are discovering, what many of us have discovered, that just as you lose in any arena of life where you ignore the context and the principles, you lose in life when you ignore the wisdom, and you refuse to submit to the father of all truth and all wisdom.

It was this principle that I just described, in part, that drove the author of the verse we’re going to look at today to write what he did.  He was said to be the wisest man in the world.  And if you know anything about Solomon you know that even though he was the wisest man in the world he laid aside that wisdom and sought satisfaction in sex, money, alcohol and really anything else he could think of under the sun.  And he came to the conclusion that all of that was meaningless.  In other words, there is no satisfaction in any of that stuff.  When he tried out everything in life and ignored the God who was behind it all he came to the conclusion that it was all vanity, meaningless, a waste.  There is no fulfillment, there is no satisfaction in life outside of the context of submission to the God who’s behind all that I have seen and all that I’ve experienced.  And so, with that in mind, look at what Solomon writes in Proverbs 9:10:

The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom…  in other words, wisdom begins, wisdom begins, in terms of all of life just like wisdom begins in any arena.  God says that wisdom in general, wisdom in life begins with the fear of the lord.

Let me give you a definition for the fear of the Lord:  The fear of the Lord simply means recognition and reverence that leads to submission. The fear of the Lord is recognition and reverence that leads to submission.  That is:  I recognize the You’re God and I’m not, which means you’re always smarter than I am, which means that even when you ask me to do something that I don’t understand that there’s something behind it that I will understand, therefore, I’m going to say yes even before I understand.  And not only do I recognize You for who You are, I’m going to revere you, that is, I am going to reverence you and I’m going to do what anyone would do who recognizes that there is a God.

You know what you do when you come face to face with the fact that there is a God in heaven?  You know what the natural, ordinary, normal thing to do is if you really believe that there is a God who controls all things and is behind all things?  What else can you do but submit?  How do you resist God?  How do you say no to God?  How do you argue with God?  How do you try to outsmart God, or prove to God that he’s been illogical?  See, the natural thing to do when you come face to face with the fact that there is a God is to submit and surrender.  It’s just a natural response.  The fear of the Lord that is the beginning of all wisdom is to recognize that He is God and you are not.  And to respond like anyone would respond who recognized that there is a God and they are not him.  And that is simply to submit to Him as we submit every single day to all kinds of rules and regulations and laws for the sake of the result or the return we get from submitting.

And Solomon says, “I’m here to tell you:  the beginning of wisdom as it relates to all of life, the beginning is the submission to, the recognition of the fact that God is God and you are not.  That it’s not about what.  It’s about who.  It’s not about what he asks.  It’s about who is doing the asking.  That the beginning of wisdom is not consideration of God.  The beginning of wisdom is not contemplation of God’s will.  The beginning of wisdom is to say “Yes, yes, yes.  Now what is the question?”  To say, “God, because You’re God, I’m going to say yes regardless of what you say because, after all, you’re God.”  Solomon says that’s the beginning of wisdom.

He goes on to elaborate in the second half of the verse:  The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and knowledge of the Holy One is understanding.  That is literally, knowledge of God brings understanding to all of life.

Here’s what Solomon discovered:  As I feared the Lord, that is, as I have revered and submitted to God, I’ve gained great understanding.  All of a sudden I have these A-ha moments where I say, “No wonder you said that God, no wonder you require that God, no wonder you ask me to do that God, no wonder you said no to that God, no wonder your standards are so high God.  A-ha, now that I have submitted to You I am beginning to understand.”  Submission comes first, understanding comes later.

And he goes on to say that as your understanding of the Holy One increases it leads to wisdom.  Just like in any other arena, as you approach life you begin to understand God’s rules, God’s principles, God’s regulations, and as you understand and submit to them you are then liberated and freed up to know what your options are, and you’re liberated and freed up to make the wisest choices possible.  Because in your submission and your understanding, there you find wisdom for life.  Isn’t that powerful?

This takes us back to our premise:  That in every arena of life there are rules regulations and principles and if you discover and submit to them you are able to make wise decisions.  God says, “the same is true in the broadest sense of life, that if you come to me, and you submit to who I am, if you submit to what I want you to know, you will gain understanding, and from your understanding you will be freed up to make the wisest choice possible.

Isn’t it interesting, that for most of us, maybe all of us, but at least most of us, our greatest regrets were at a time when we were consciously running from God?  Isn’t it interesting that in those moments when you decided to move in, when you decided to say yes, when you decided to move, you decided to go there, you decided to stay late, whatever the deal was, isn’t it interesting that there was something in us that we think of as conscience, but for many of us it is more than conscience.  It was a God thing, and you decided, “I’m not going to listen.  I’m going to do my own thing.  God, the answer is no.”  And we look back and wonder why it didn’t work out.  We wonder why that’s the chapter in our lives where there was the most regret.  And it’s because of this principle.

And Solomon says, “I’m telling you, the beginning of wisdom isn’t experience.  The beginning of wisdom is when I say yes.  It’s when I submit to the God of all wisdom.

Can I tell you something?  Your heavenly father wants you to have a regret free life.  But you and I cannot create that on our own.  And if we’re honest, we all know that we have enough tears, enough scars, enough hurt to know that when we try to do things on our own and tell God to “stay out of my life, I’m going to do what I want.”  We don’t end up with the life that we hoped we’d get.  That’s because the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and knowledge of the Holy One is understanding.

None of us in here this morning wants to end up with a life that’s a mess.  None of us wants to end up with a life that’s filled with regrets and disappointments.  But as long as we cling to our pride and say, “I’m going to do things my way.  And I’ll leverage your principles when they fit into my agenda.  And I’ll follow your principles when they get me to where I want to go.  And I’m willing to submit to all kinds of people that you’ve created.  And I’m willing to submit to all kinds of systems that have been established by people that you’ve created, but when it comes to just wholeheartedly selling out and submitting to you, forget it, because I’m going to do what I want to do.”

If that’s you, can you understand why your heavenly father’s heart breaks?  Why he’s not angry, but why he’s sorrowful?  Because He knows what together you could become, and he stands on the sidelines honoring your freedom, refusing to interfere, and watches instead what you’re becoming.

Now, everybody got a box of matches, I want you to get it out.  I want you to hold it just like this.  This is how we come into the world, isn’t it?  My life.  My money, my relationships, my morality, my evenings, my spring breaks, my college freshman year, my, my, my, my, my, my, my.  I want you to know, that as your pastor, my heart’s desire, and I believe the heart’s desire of our heavenly father, is I want us to be a community of people that says, “It’s yours.  I’ve seen what I can do on my own.  I’m ready to see what you can do as I submit and recognize who you are and give you the opportunity to guide and direct and protect me.”

See isn’t it true, and if you’ve been here for the past few weeks you know we’ve been talking about what is the wise thing to do?  In light of my past experience, in light of my current circumstances, in light of my future hopes and dreams, what is the wise thing to do?  That I am a unique blend of past, present and future, so it’s not enough to say, “What is everybody else doing?”  It’s not enough to say, “What does the Law say?”  It’s not enough to say, “What’s moral?”  The best question of all is what is the wise thing for me to do?

Isn’t it true that at times when we try to apply this, the reason we don’t ask, what is the wise thing to do, is because I already know what the wise thing to do is.  My problem isn’t that I don’t know what to do in light of my past, present and future.  The problem is that I don’t want to ask what the wise thing to do is because I already know the answer.  That’s why this issue is the most important issue when it comes to wisdom.  The beginning of wisdom is not asking the question.  The beginning of wisdom is saying, “God, regardless of the answer, I’m available.  In light of my past experience, my current circumstances, my future hopes and dreams, I really do want to know what the wise thing to do is, and I have pre-decided to say yes to you my God and my king.  Now, what is the wise thing for me to do?”

The desire of your heavenly father is that you would foolproof your life.  The desire of your heavenly father is that you would ask the best question of all.  But the beginning is not the best question of all.  The beginning is the best decision of all. To pre-decide.  That is, you guide me in wisdom and I’m going to say yes, because I trust you.

Now I want you to hold on to your box of matches one more time.  Some of you have been a Christian for a while and I want to ask you this:  Who’s holding your life?  I know you believe in your head that Jesus died for your sins and rose from the grave.  You’ve got that knowledge in your head, but have you ever made the decision that whatever the question is the answer is yes?  Have you pre-decided to say yes?

Some of you who are Christians have done that.  You’ve made the best decision ever that the answer is yes, but you’re not sure what that means.  I mean, there are so many issues.  There are so many choices.  There are so many opinions out there.  So here’s my question for you:  Where are you going to find out what this means?  Here are two things you need to do:  One, you need to spend time praying and reading your Bible every day.  Two, you need to be in a Hub group.  Those two things, practiced consistently, will provide you with some handles for this.

Some of you have felt God kind of knocking on the door of your heart and you’ve been saying, “Ok, ok, ok, and today you’re sitting there like this.  You are so close to saying, “God, I’m just going to surrender control of my life to you.”  Well, in a moment we are going to close with a song and I want you to, in the quietness of your own heart, to say to God, today’s my day.  I’m surrendering control of my life to you.  The answer is yes, yes, yes.  I’m no longer afraid to ask what is the wise thing to do, because I’ve pre-decided to say yes, as I surrender to you.

Others of you, you’re not a Christian, you came for the free donuts, you thought you were coming to see Paranormal Activity and instead you got us, you’ve got questions, you’re still struggling with this whole God thing, if there is a God, who is God, and if you could just figure out if this whole God/Jesus thing is for real then you would want to want to open your hand.  You don’t want to, but you want to want to.   “I want to want to, but I don’t want to yet.”  Here’s what I want you to do.  As we sing in a minute, I want you to just tell your heavenly father that.  You don’t even have to believe that he’s there, but tell him honestly what’s going on in your mind.  Ask that he’d bring you to the place where you can make the best decision ever and then just see if he shows up.  Be honest and tell him what’s in your heart.  He can handle that.

In all of life we submit to rules, regulations, principles in order to make wise decisions.  In life in general the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and knowledge of the Holy One is understanding.  Isn’t it time to submit to the God who wants to take your life and make it foolproof?



Here we are in part five of this series we’ve titled:  Fool Proof.  And a few weeks ago when we began this series we said there was one question we need to ask of every decision, every opportunity, every invitation that comes your way.  What we said was that this one question has the ability to fool proof your marriage, fool proof your finances, fool proof your career, fool proof your life.  We called this the best question of all, and I want you to say it with me:  What is the wise thing to do?

In light of my past experience, current circumstances and future hopes and dreams, what is the wise thing to do?

This morning we’re going to take a little bit of a detour and ask this question:  What happens if you really are committed to doing the wise thing, but you don’t know what the wise thing is?  What if you’re at a point where you’re willing to say, “God, I really do want to do the wise thing, I’m ready to quit pretending, to quit playing games, I’m ready to quit deceiving myself and to quit doing what everybody else is doing, and asking where’s the line instead of asking, what is the wise thing to do?  I really do want to know what the wise thing to do is, but I don’t know what the wise thing to do is in this particular relationship.  I don’t know what the wise thing to do is in this particular arena of my finances.  I don’t know what the wise thing is to do professionally.  I don’t know what the wise thing to do is in light of what’s going on in my marriage.  I’m going to ask the question, but I’m not sure what the wise thing to do is.

I think there are two main areas where most of us struggle with figuring out what the wise thing to do is:  The first is in arenas where there’s a lot of emotion.  Emotion is like a fog in the decision-making process.

It can be a positive emotion like, “I’m in love.”  I mean, love is a fog, isn’t it?  “Five bedrooms.”  “No money down.”  There are all kinds of emotions that impact and fog our decision making process.  And when there’s a lot of high emotion it’s difficult to see straight and make wise decisions.  It’s difficult to know what the wise thing to do is.

It can be a negative emotion as well.  You’re really, really angry, or you’re jealous, or you’re very, very resentful, you’re not getting your way, and suddenly you find yourself about to make a decision, and even in those moments when you realize there’s all this stuff, uugghh, going on inside of you and you know you need to ask, what is the wise thing to do, but in that fog of emotion, it is very difficult to see straight.  It’s very difficult to discern, what is the wise thing to do.

In fact, I bet this, I bet your greatest regret, whether it was a night, or a season of life, or a marriage, or a weekend or a spring break or whatever it might be, I bet your greatest regret has to do with decisions you made when there was a lot of emotion.  It might have been anger.  It might have been lust.  It might have been somebody who was trying to sell you something and they pressured you into something.  See, your greatest regret, and mine, were unwise decisions that we made when our emotions were swirling around and we just couldn’t see straight.

A second environment where I have a hard time discerning what the wise thing to do is, and maybe you can relate to this, it’s when I’m asked to make a decision within a realm that I don’t really have enough expertise to make a decision in.  Maybe it’s a lack of education, training or experience.

Maybe it’s because I’m the leader or I’m the father, or whatever the situation is, I’m asked to make a decision and I just don’t have the background or the education or the experience to make a wise decision.

If you’re a leader, if you own your own company or you’re a manager you understand this, when you’re the point person you feel as if, “I’m supposed to know, and whether I know or not I need to at least look like I know.  And I need to say something intelligent,” so you ask them to give you a minute and you run to a back room and say, “Oh God, I don’t know what to do!”

But you’re supposed to know.  You’re the manager, you’re supposed to know.  You’re the dad, you’re supposed to know.  You’re the president, you’re the head of the student body, whatever, you’re supposed to know.  But when you don’t have the experience or the expertise or whatever, how do you make a wise decision in those realms where there’s a lot of emotion or where you don’t have the expertise you need?

I want to tell you a secret this morning.  This is the secret of all wise people.  Every wise person you know, knows this secret.  In fact, this is how they became wise.  In fact, when I tell you this secret you are going to realize that they weren’t as wise as you thought they were.  But they sure seem to be wise, because here’s what every wise person knows:  Wise people know when they don’t know, and they’re not afraid to go to those who know.  Wise people know when they don’t know.  That is they don’t deceive themselves, they don’t pretend, they don’t act like they’re smarter than they are.  Wise people know when they’ve reached the end of their knowledge.  Wise people know when there’s too much emotion.  Wise people know when they don’t know and they are courageous enough, they’re not afraid, and oohh, that takes a lot of security to say, “I’m in charge, and I have no idea.  I’m your father, and I don’t know either.  I’m your mother, we need to think about this.  I’m in charge, I’m the manager, I’m whatever.

Wise people know when they don’t know and they are not afraid to go to those who know.  Every wise person you know, the people you consider wise, you talk to them and they’ll probably say it in a different way, but here’s what they know:  Every wise person knows when they reach the end, when it’s not a good time to make a decision, when they don’t know and they are not afraid to go to people who know.  Wise people seek wise council.

Now that’s not intuitive, because you think, “If they’re wise then they don’t need wise counsel.”  That’s wrong.  They get counsel, that’s why they are wise.

The most amazing insights into the Bible is that the wisest person in the whole Bible, other than Jesus, the wisest man who ever lived was a king named Solomon.  And God gave him the gift of wisdom.  He had more wisdom than anyone who had ever lived.  He was the wisest man in the world.  And the wisest man who ever lived had more to say about seeking counsel than anyone else who wrote in the Bible.

Now you would think that the wisest man would say nothing about seeking counsel.  Why would the wisest man in the world say so much about seeking counsel?  Because, he’s the wisest man in the world.  Because wise people know when they don’t know, and they’re not afraid to go to those who know.

Let me just throw a few of these verses up on the screen.  A wise man will hear and increase in learning (that is, they will listen), and a man of understanding will acquire wise counsel. Proverbs 1:5.  Now you say, “Wait a minute, they are a man of understanding or a woman of understanding, why would they aquire wise counsel?”  How do you think they became a man or a woman of understanding?  That even with all they know, they are not afraid to increase what they know by asking other people.  Look at this second one.

The way of a fool is right in his own eyes (that is, “I don’t need anyone telling me what to do.  I’ve got it all figured out.  I’m 18, I’m a freshman in college, I just graduated from college, I own my own company)  The way of a fool is right in his own eyes, but a wise man (no age, no matter what age) is he who listens to counsel. Proverbs 12:15.  In other words, this is what characterizes wise people.  A wise person never gets so wise that they don’t need counsel.  A wise person is always listening out for wise counsel.  That’s how they became wise.

Wise men and women know when they don’t know and they’re not afraid to go to those who know.

Now let me tell you why this is so important and we’re going to look at an Old Testament story that illustrates this in a minute found in Genesis 41.  You can go ahead and find it, put your handout in there or something and we’ll come back to it in a minute, but here’s why this is so important.  These few insights could possibly change your whole perspective on getting counsel.  Here’s the deal, I’m going to make three statements:

First:  The decisions, in fact I would say many or most, many or most of the decisions that you make privately and independently, that is the decisions you made in the quietness of your own heart, independent of any outside advice, the decisions you make privately or independently will later on become public knowledge, right?  You privately decide to buy a house, before long everybody knows where you live.  You privately and independently decide to lease a car, everybody knows what you drive.  You privately and independently decide to ask here out, before long everybody knows you’ve asked her out.  You privately and independently decided to take this new job, before long everybody knows you have a new job.  Most of the decisions we make privately and independently eventually become public knowledge, right?

Secondly, and this is the tricky one, most, or at least many, of the decisions you make privately and independently are judged by the people around you.  I don’t know if this is just me, but Liz and I talk about our friends….  We do.  We just lost some of our friends with that statement…but we hear stuff and say, “Did you know that he just asked her out?  Did you know that they’re moving?  Did you see their new house?  Did you see, did you know?  Maybe it’s just us but we talk about the decisions our friends make.  Don’t you?

And isn’t it true, and maybe we’re not supposed to do this, but it’s just human nature, but isn’t it true that in some way, shape, or form you pass judgement on the decisions that your friends make.  “I can’t believe she’s doing that.  I can’t believe he’s marrying her.  I can’t believe they’re splitting up.  I can’t believe….  I mean I know we’re not supposed to judge, but isn’t it true, and if you’re a teenager you do this all the time, at every area of life, don’t we pass judgment on the decisions that people around us make?  I don’t mean we’re negative or critical, but we do this.

Well, the same is true of you.  You have a public.  It may be 20 or 200 people, but people are constantly passing judgment on the decisions you make privately and independently.

Third statement:  For many of us, the decisions that we make privately and independently are not only known by the public, not only judged by the public, but the decisions that we make privately and independently effect other people.  As a pastor, every decision I make about Hub City effects a lot of people.  I can make it privately and independently, but the effects are felt publicaly.  Every decision that I make as a father in our home, I may make it privately or independently, but the effects are felt by at least four other people.  The decisions that you make privately and independently, the effects or the results of those decisions are felt publicly.

So here’s the question:  If your decisions, as you’re trying to discern what’s the wise thing to do in a certain relationship, what’s the wise thing to do financially, what’s the wise thing to do professionally, what’s the wise thing to do here, if the results of those decisions are number one, going to be known publicly; number 2, are going to be judged publicly; and number three, are going to effect other people, then why not get other people in on the decision making process before the decision is made because it’s not going to be a secret after the decision is made?

That just makes sense.  This is how wise people end up making so many wise decisions.  Because they do not make big decisions independent of counsel.  And there’s a hesitancy about this, I understand that.  You say, “It’s really none of their business.”  Let me just give you a big clue, it will become their business, because they’re going to know, and they’re going to judge and they might even be effected.  You say, “But it’s still none of their business.”  That’s irrelevant.  They are going to know.  They are going to judge.  They might even be impacted.  Since that’s a reality, wouldn’t it make sense to involve wise people in on the front end of the decision making process?  Because what is done privately and independently eventually becomes known and is judged publicly.  See, wise people know when they don’t know, and they are not afraid, they are secure enough to go to people who know.

There are so many stories in the Bible about people who sought advice or got advice.  Some got bad advice, some got good advice.  I mean, there’s so much you could say about this, but this morning we’re going to look at a familiar Old Testament story in Genesis 41.

And it’s the story about a guy named Joseph.  He lived 1900 years before Jesus.  This is 1900 BC.  Joseph was the son of a guy named Jacob.  And just to give you kind of a big picuture, there was Abraham, who was the father of the Jewish nation, and he had a son named Isaac, and Isaac had a son named Jacob and Jacob had a bunch of sons and one of them was named Joseph.  Well, Joseph gets sold by his brothers into slavery in Egypt.  He spends some time in the house of this guy named Potiphar, who was the captain of the whole Egyptian army.  While serving there he gets accused of trying to rape Potiphar’s wife.  He didn’t do it.  He was innocent, but she accused him and he was put in prison in Egypt.

Now when we get to this story, Joseph has been in prison about 10 years.  He’s 30 years old and he’s in jail when this story begins.  This is an incredible story about listening to and seeking wise counsel.  And for all the men here today, this really slaps right up against our ego and pride issues.  Because one of the reasons we’ve made some really dumb decisions men, is because we would not listen.  We would not listen to our wives.  We would not listen to people who didn’t have the same expertise as we thought they should have in order for us to listen to them.  We get ourselves into trouble because we’re not wise enough to know what we don’t know, and even when we know what we don’t know we’re too afraid, we’re too proud to ask the people who know.

Here’s an amazing story about a king who had enough sense and security to listen to the most unlikely source of wisdom imaginable.  So here’s what happens:  Pharoah, who is in charge of Egypt, the power center of that part of the world, Pharoah has a dream.  Now you tell me, those of you who know anything about Egyptian history, Pharaoh was considered a what? – A god.  He was considered a god.  He was thought to have eternal life.  He did not have to keep the law, he was the law.  I mean, at 9:00 in the morning if something was illegal it was illegal.  At 10:30, if Pharaoh changed his mind, they erased that law and wrote a new one.  He was just the law in motion.

And when you were in the presence of Pharaoh you were very, very careful because if Pharaoh was having a bad day, that could be your last day.  He just had that much power.  His word was law because he was thought to be related to the sun god so he was god.

Now, 1900 BC, around that time, Pharaoh has a dream.  And he dreams something that he thinks has significance so he asks the people around him, “Hey can you interpret the dream?”  They all sheepishly said, “Uh uh.”  But he wants to know the interpretation of the dream and there’s this guy that serves Pharaoh his wine who says to him, “you know what, you may not remember this, but I was in prison for a while when you were mad at me, and while I was there I ran into a Jewish lad, and he interpreted a dream for me, in fact he predicted that you would restore me to this position.”

And Pharaoh says, “Let’s find him.”  So Pharaoh sends the people down into the dungeon to find this Jewish boy, who’s now 30 years old because he’s been there so long.  They shave him, they dress him up and they get all the prison smell off of him and bring him, in a presentable way, to Pharaoh.

Now you’ve got to understand.  Joseph isn’t even from their country.  They’ve never met before.  And Pharaoh says to Joseph, “Hey, what was his name again?  Joseph?  Hey Joseph, here’s my dream.”  And the idea is, I’m going to tell you my dream and you interpret it and then you’re out of here, back to prison.

So he tells Joseph the dream and Joseph interprets the dream.  And the interpretation of the dream was this:  “Oh Pharaoh, may Pharaoh live forever, there are going to be seven incredible years of plenty in the land of Egypt.  You’re going to have so much grain and such good crops you’re going to have extra.  After those seven years there’s going to be seven years of famine.  Everything is going to die.  And everybody who hasn’t saved grain from the seven previous years, they will die as well.”

So Joseph interprets this dream.  That’s all he’s there for.  And at that point, Joseph should shut his mouth, turn around and head down the hall.  But Joseph does an unthinkable thing that could have cost him his life.  Joseph decides to give some advice to Pharaoh/god/the law in motion/the most powerful man in the world.  And that’s where this story picks up.  And we can’t fully understand these circumstances, but this was way out there for anyone to do.  And look what Joseph does, verse 33 of chapter 41.

Joseph’s just finished interpreting this dream for Pharaoh and here’s where Joseph’s supposed to make his exit but he keeps going:  And now (dun-dun-du-nah.  And now for a little editorial comment on the dream interpretation.  I’m not finished yet.)  And now, let Pharaoh (Now, no-one’s ever said that before to Pharaoh.  No one’s ever told Pharaoh, “Now let me tell you what I think you should do.  After all, I’ve been in prison for 10 years.  I’m not even from this country.  We’ve only known each other for 20 minutes.  You’re the most powerful man in the world.  You think you’re god.  Let me tell you what you ought to do.)  Now let Pharaoh look for a discerning and wise man and put him in charge of the land of Egypt

Implication:  Pharaoh, this job’s too big for you.  You’re going to have to find somebody else to take over.  I know you’re supposedly god, and I saw you’re building out there, it’s neat and all.  But I’m telling you what Pharaoh, because I’m a Jewish guy from a different country and I’ve been in prison for ten years, this job’s too big for you.

Can you imagine?  I mean, isn’t it true, especially men, isn’t it true, doesn’t something, when somebody starts to tell you your business, let me tell you, when someone who doesn’t understand or work in my world starts to tell me how I ought to be starting a church, oohh, the walls start to go up.

Isn’t it true, in your business, especially if somebody doesn’t know your business, if somebody starts telling you what you need to do, or how you can improve, ooohhh.  How about if somebody tells you how to raise your kids, how to discipline your kids?  “You know, I realize I’m 16 years old, and I’ve never had kids, but I am your babysitter, and I’ve got a few suggestions.”  Aren’t you open, “Oh yeah, tell me.”  Isn’t it true, when somebody comes into our realm and they start speaking into our profession, into our world, into where we have authority to tell us what to do, don’t the walls just go up?

This is unbelievable, Pharaoh, for whatever reason, decides to listen to what Joseph has to say.  He says, verse 34, Let Pharaoh appoint commissioners over the land to take a fifth of the harvest of Egypt during the seven years of abundance.  They should collect all the food of these good years that are coming and store up the grain under the authority of pharaoh, to be kept in the cities for food.

This is brilliant, if you’re in business you need to go back and read this in detail, but he gives them this unbelievable plan and the plan is this:  Over the next 7 years take 20% of everything that you get and store it.  Every year you store a fifth of it.  You keep storing it and storing it and storing it.  And Joseph tells pharaoh, I want you to store it in your name.  In other words, pharaoh, you claim authority, this grain belongs, not to the nation, this grain belongs to you.

Verse 36:  This food should be held in reserve for the country, to be used during the seven years of famine that will come upon Egypt, so that the country may not be ruined by the famine (In other words, during the good years save 20% and then when the bad years come, not only will you be fine, but you’ll be the only nation around that’s fine.)  The plan seemed good to pharaoh and all of his officials. You’ve got to understand, all of the officials are kind of looking at each other going, I can’t believe that pharaoh is listening to this guy an allowing this to go on.  So Pharaoh asked them, “Can we find anyone like this man, one in whom is the spirit of God?”  Then Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Since God has made all of this known to you, there is no one so discerning and wise as you.  You shall be in charge of my palace, and all my people are to submit to your orders.  Only with respect to the throne will I be greater than you.”  So Pharaoh said to Joseph, “I hereby put you in charge of the whole land of Egypt.  (Pause)  Then Pharaoh took a signet ring from his finger and put it on Joseph’s finger.  He dressed him in robes of fine linen and put a gold chain around his neck.

See, I would have thrown him out.  “Fine, fine, fine.  I know, you’re an economic genius.  I’m so sure you can tell me how to run the whole nation.”  But Pharaoh listened.  Wise people know when they don’t know, and they are not afraid to find and listen to people who know.  Wise people know when they are hearing what’s true, wise people aren’t afraid of hearing what’s true, and they don’t discount the source because they know truth when they hear it.

This plan was so brilliant, I just want to take a few seconds to tell you the details of the story.  Seven years of plenty come so now Pharaoh owns 20% of all the grain, so when seven bad years came and all the people in Egypt were out of grain and guess who owns all the grain?  Pharaoh.  So all the people in Egypt have to come to Pharaoh to buy grain, not from the nation, but from Pharaoh himself.  So at the end of the seven years Pharaoh is not only in charge of everything in Egypt, he owns everything and everybody in Egypt.  It’s unbelievable.  He owns all their cattle, all their land.  He personally owns it all.  And not only that, the surrounding nations had to come to Egypt to buy grain, so without ever firing a shot Pharaoh basically takes control of all the economies of all the surrounding nations.  Unbelievable!  Because he knew what he didn’t know, and he didn’t discount the source and he took the advice of a foreigner who was a slave in his own dungeon.

Three things I want us to pull from this story:

Number 1:  No one is so successful that he or she no longer needs wise counsel.  No one is so wise, no one is so successful that they no longer need wise counsel.  Nobody.  Solomon wasn’t too wise to listen.  Pharaoh wasn’t to powerful to listen.  If Pharaoh needed it, if Solomon needed it, then I need it and you need it.  No matter how successful you are.  No matter how educated you are.  No matter how much smarter or how much greater your IQ is.  No matter how much you own or how powerful you are.  Nobody ever gets to the place where they don’t need wise counsel.

And the temptation is to think, once I’m here, I am the wise counsel, people must come to me, I am the source of all things.  No one, no one, no one, because every wise person knows the end, every wise person knows the limit, every wise person knows when they don’t know and they are not afraid to find the people who know.

Number 2:  You will never reach your full potential without utilizing the wisdom of others.  You will never reach your full potential without utilizing the wisdom of others.  You just won’t.  You know when we think we will?  When we’re 16, and we think we will when we’re 17, and we think we will when we’re college freshmen because now we’re so much smarter than our parents, we knew we were smarter, but now we’re in college and they just haven’t been exposed to what we’ve been exposed to.  You know when else we think we will?  When we don’t have kids yet, but we know how to parent.  Or when our kids aren’t teenagers yet, but we know we’re going to have it together when they become teenagers.

And there’s something in all of us, in some realm, and is certain areas of life where we think all we need to know is what we already know and that we’re beyond getting the counsel of other people.  Here’s the deal:  You may do well, but you will never reach your full potential without outside input.  Tiger Woods has a coach, and I be he’s a better golfer than his coach.  But he knows you don’t reach your full potential without outside input.  Every professional athlete knows that.  But somehow, when it comes to parenting, somehow when it comes to running our business, somehow when it comes to our spiritual life, somehow when it comes to our dating relationships, somehow when it comes to our marriages, somehow we think, “I can be all I need to be, I don’t need anybody to tell me what to do.”  But every wise person knows when they don’t know and they are not afraid to go to the people who know.  You’ll never reach your full potential without going outside of what you know.

The third one is this:  Wise counsel may come from unlikely sources.  Wise counsel may come from very unlikely sources, and here’s the temptation:  The temptation is to say, “Well, if I’m here financially, or I’m here in terms of success, or I’m here in terms of being a parent, or I’m here, then the only people I can go to for wise counsel have to be ahead of me, above me or beyond me.  They have to be peers who have excelled more than I have.  And that is absolutely wrong.

And if anything comes from the story of Pharaoh and Joseph is this:  Pharaoh was wise enough to know that sometimes wisdom comes from unlikely sources.

Who knows the source that God wants to use to speak into your relationships, to speak into your marriage, to speak into your business, to speak into your finances.  Because wise people know when they don’t know and they are wide open.  They don’t think, “Well if you are going to speak into my life you’ve got to be a peer who’s a year ahead, or who’s financially ahead or professionally ahead.  Hey, I’m at the end, I am wide open”

Let me tell you when I struggle with this principle.  My tendency is to listen to the messenger and if there’s something in their life, or there’s something in their past, or there’s something that’s going on in their life right now, I have a tendency to use that as an excuse not to listen.  After all, if they’re so smart why didn’t they?  And I just by-pass that advice.  Hey, if they’re so wise then I wonder why they?  And I just by-pass that advice.  Maybe you’re a teenager and your parents are trying to give you some advice, and you say, “well they didn’t follow that advice.”  Maybe there’s someone who’s trying to speak some wisdom into your life and you allow something in their past or something in their life that you don’t agree with, you use that to discount what you know in your heart is good advice.  It’s a tragic, tragic mistake.

And fortunately for Pharaoh, and for the people of Egypt and for the whole world, Pharaoh understood:  It doesn’t matter how long he’s been in the dungeon, it doesn’t matter where he’s from, but there’s something wise in his counsel, so everybody, shut up and let the new guy talk.

Do not discount the unlikely sources of wisdom.  Wise people know better than to do that.

Now, part of this is just commons sense, I realize that, but do you know why we push back on this?  Part of the reason we push back is because we don’t really want to know what the wise thing to do is.  And you’ve got to deal with that, and hopefully at the end of this series you’ll deal once and for all with that.  But often times we don’t want to hear what other people have to say because we already know what they are going to say.  The other reason we push back is this excuse that it’s nobody else’s business, but you just remember this:  Your private, independent will become other people’s business because people know what we decide, so why not take advantage of their advice on the front end of the decision making process?

Let me ask you:  Are you in the midst of an emotionally intense situation where you’re trying to figure out what the wise thing to do is?  Maybe it’s love, maybe it’s anger, maybe it’s jealousy, maybe it’s something you’re about to buy; you’ve got your heart set on it, you’ve got your heart set on him, you’ve got your heart set on that.  Get somebody in the mix.  The emotions make it difficult oftentimes to discern what’s wise.  In the middle of making a decision where you’re really just out of your league, but people expect you to know, you’re the leader, you’re the dad, you’re the mom, you’re the CEO, you’re the whatever, but people expect you to know and you feel this internal pressure:  “I ought to know and if I don’t know I need to fake it and I need to confidently say here’s where we’re going and if people aren’t sure I’ll say it louder because if I say it loud enough people will say “he knows.””  But in your heart you know you don’t know.  Then the smart thing to do, what wise people do, don’t pretend.  Wise people know when they don’t know and they are not afraid to go to those who know.

And if you’re coming to the understanding that this really is the best question ever:  What is the wise thing to do?  Then when you don’t know, ask.  And that doesn’t mean you lack wisdom.  That is evidence of wisdom.

When we began this series a few weeks ago we said that we’ve all done dumb things.  There are decisions we wish we’d never made.  Dates we wish we’d never gone on.  Money we wish we’d never spent.  We’ve all got something or some period in our past that we look back on with regret.

And the goal of this series is to figure out a way that we could live a life with no regret.  To figure out a way to foolproof our lives.  And the way we said to do that is not to ask where’s the line, where’s the ledge, what’s legal, what’s moral, what’s right?  The way to foolproof our lives is for us to begin asking of every decision, every opportunity the best question ever:  What is the wise thing to do?  What is the wise thing to do?

And we need to ask this question at three different levels:  In light of my past experience, what is the wise thing to do?  In light of my current circumstances, what is the wise thing to do?  And in light of my future hopes and dreams, what is the wise thing to do?  And the reason this question is the best question ever is because no one has the unique past, present and future that you do.  So in light of your past, in light of your present and in light of your future, what is the wise thing for you to do?  Of every decision we make, we need to ask:  What is the wise thing to do?

And then last week we talked about our time.  And the question for us isn’t, what time is it?  The question for us is:  How are we spending our time?  Are we making the incremental investments of time into the things that will bring value to our lives in the long run?  What do we need to begin doing on a regular basis that over time would have cumulative value?  What do we need to stop doing because it’s not the wisest way for us to spend our time?  What is the wise thing to do when it comes to how we spend our time?

Now last week I asked you to take off your watches and hide them for the entire sermon to orient us to the fact that how we spend our time is important to God.  This morning I want to do something to make you more uncomfortable.  I want you to get out your wallet.  Go ahead, get it out.  Maybe you need to reach down to your purse and grab it or pull out your money clip.  Whatever it is that you have on you where you keep your cash, or wish you had cash or keep your credit cards, go ahead and get it out.  What I want you to do is, we’re going to pass a bucket around and I want you to put your wallet in that and after the service we’ll give it back.  Just kidding.

Now I know that freaked some of you out a bit because that’s one of your worst fears about coming to a church gathering.  The last thing you want us to be talking about today is money.  You were worried that people were going to hassle you about money and then you show up today and we’re talking about money and some of you are going to leave mad because we’re talking about money and I just want to acknowledge that here at the start, and get that out in the open.

Which leads me to these three chairs.  We talked about these two weeks ago and what they represented and I think it’s important to remind ourselves of what we talked about.  We said that if your not going to be wise in your decision making that you’re going to find yourself sitting in one of three chairs:  The Naïve, the fool and the scoffer.  Now, in light of us talking about money this morning, many of us in this room are sitting in one of these three chairs and you’re probably going to have one of these responses to what we talk about and I just wanted to acknowledge that up front.  Because remember, there’s a consequence for sitting in these chairs, not just for you, but for those who are closest to you.  So if you just blow me off, you’re going to reap something from that attitude.  If you just don’t care, there’s going to be a consequence.  If you get mad and want to cuss me out and never come back again, that’s cool, just remember, there’s a consequence.  And some of you could stand up and vouch for those consequences right now.

So let’s jump into this.  If you’re not a Christian you might not agree with this or think this is something weird about God, but we as Christians believe that the Bible teaches that God owns everything, including your money.  It’s all his.  And as a result of that, your Heavenly Father has entrusted you with some of his money.  Now, the question that most of us ask about money is how much money do you have in your account, or how much money do you make?  But that’s the wrong question.  The question I want you to focus on this morning is, are you being wise in how you manage the money that your Heavenly Father has entrusted to you?

Or, let’s ask it this way:  In light of your past financial experience, in light of your current financial circumstances and in light of your future financial hopes and dreams, what is the wise thing to do with God’s money?

Now, let me tell you what I know about you.  None of us wants somebody to tell us how to spend our money.  None of us wants somebody poking their head into our financial business, especially some preacher.  Because isn’t it true that when you think about a sermon on money you think of some TV preacher begging for money or some pastor begging for money so the church can stay in business, and just the thought of a sermon on money makes some of you want to check out of this sermon.  Some of you already have a wall up.  You don’t want to hear about money.  You’re already mad and have made up your mind never to come back again.

But let me tell you what you know about yourself:  You already know that you would have more money in the bank and greater peace of mind if you had managed your money more wisely.  You know that one of the greatest struggles you have is living with the money you have.

And chances are, if you had been evaluating your financial decisions through the grid of the best question ever, you might live in a slightly smaller or older house with slightly less expensive furniture.  You would be driving a slightly older car.  Your television wouldn’t be quite as big.  Your closet wouldn’t be quite as full.

On the postitive side, your 401(k) would be maxed out, your credit card balance would be zero at the end of the month, and you would feel free to generously support those organizations that are making a positive difference in the world.

Believe it or not, if you had been managing the money you’ve been given the way I am about to suggest, you would actually be richer and happier.  Not that you would be happier because you are rich, but you would be happier because you would be free from the unnecessary pressures that come with poor money management.

See, I want what’s best for you financially.  This morning I’m not going to ask for something from you.  This morning I am going to share with you what I want for you financially, and what I believe God wants for you financially, because I want what’s best for you financially and I believe that God wants what’s best for you financially.

Now I’m not saying that God wants you to be rich.  By international standards, you are rich.  The average college student in America makes $11,200 a year.  That’s more than 96% of the world’s population makes.  According to most of the world, we are rich.  But if I were to sit down one on one with you and ask you this question you would have a hard time answering, “How does it feel to be rich?”

You know why you would have a hard time answering that?  Because there is a difference between being rich and feeling rich.  The reason none of us feels rich is because we don’t actually have any extra cash.  It’s all spoken for.  You’re like me:  There’s more month than money at times.  There are more bills to pay than bills to pay them.  We don’t feel rich because we owe more money than we have in our checking account.  We don’t feel rich because, financially speaking, somehow we’ve gotten upside down.

Think about it.  If suddenly, something happened and you had to come up with all the cash to pay off everyone you owe, including your mortgage lender, you would be out on the street.  And as long as this is the case for each of us then we will never feel rich.

Instead, we’ll always feel stressed.  Let me say this again, as long as we are upside down financially, it won’t matter how much money we make.  We will never feel rich.  Never.   I mean the guy who makes $350,000 a year but spends $375,000 a year and has a bunch of debt will never feel as rich as the single woman who make $30,000 a year and lives on 75% of it with no debt.  She is free.  He is not.  She is wise.  He is foolish.

Now let me just say this:  Logically, of all the areas of life that require wisdom, the arena of our finances should be the easiest for us to get a handle on.  I mean, the other decisions that we make about career, relationships, and time requires us to use the subjective, intangibles of passion, fear and God’s calling.  But money is simple:  A certain amount comes in and you tell it what to do.  That’s it.  It’s simple.  A certain amount comes in and you tell it what to do.

See, your problem and my problem financially is not low income.  Your problem and my problem is poor financial management.  How do I know this?  Just look at the two biggest crisis that Americans face today:  Obesity and consumer debt.  We eat too much and we spend too much.  Neither of these problems is caused by earning too little.  We don’t see the poor people in Kenya struggling with these issues.  These problems are actually uniquely American and the result of us being one of the wealthiest nations on earth.

So what’s happening?  What’s our problem?  Why is it so easy for us to abandon common sense in the one arena of life where it is easiest to monitor and predict the outcomes?  Why do we spend so foolishly?  Why do we finance things that lose 10 to 20 percent of their value as soon as we leave the store or drive off the lot?  Why do we make ourselves slaves to financial institutions that don’t even know our names?  Why do we intentionally strap on the unnecessary pressure that comes from debt and then complain about it?

Are we greedy?  Maybe.  Are we stupid?  I don’t think so.  Are we all just consumed with keeping up with the people around us?  That may be part of it.  But I think there’s something else that keeps us on stressed out financially.  We have allowed the current of culture to influence the way we manage money by teaching us to ask all the wrong questions.  Can I afford it?  What will the monthly payment be?  How much can I borrow?  Is it on sale?  Is it cheaper to lease?  How long do I have to pay it off?

See, when it comes to spending money we all make assumptions:  The assumption is that if I can make it work financially, I should make it work.  If I can afford it, I should afford it.  If I can borrow it, I should borrow it.

The reason we so easily get upside down financially is because everybody who has anything to sell is working overtime to get us to buy, to get us to flip our financial world upside down.  The only person looking out for your best interest financially is you!  And if you are going flip your finances right side up you’ve got to ask a different set of questions.  The questions we listed out a minute ago are fine for conventional people, but you don’t want to be a conventional person, do you?  A conventional person is standard, typical, normal.  When you look at the normal, the typical, the standard people that you work with, that you live with, that you live next to, do you want to be like everybody else in America or, financially, do you want to live by a new standard?  Do you want to be enslaved to the typical way of doing things or do you want to experience financial freedom?

But what would happen if we began evaluating all of our financial decisions through the lens of the best question ever?  In light of your past financial experience, your current financial picture, and your future financial hopes and dreams, what is the wise thing to do with God’s money?

Just imagine.  Where would you be now if you had been asking and applying that question to all of your financial decisions?  The best question ever frees you from the conventional approach to finances, an approach that has robbed so many of us from the freedom that could be ours if we would simply live on what we make instead of what we can borrow.  Asking, what is the wise thing to do, allows us to be content with more of what we have and less of what we want.

But here’s the problem:  Asking the right question is one thing, but trying to discern the right answer is another thing altogether.  So how could this look for you and for me on a regular basis?  How does asking, what is the wise thing to do financially, really look?  It’s all about reordering our financial priorities.

There are basically three things we do with our money.  We’ve talked about this before, but basically we do three things:  We Live on money, save money and give money away.  There may be one or two or three other categories that you might come up with but all our money basically goes to three places:  we live on it, save it or give it.

And two things determine how much money goes into each of these categories:  Priorities and self control.

The problem with most of us is that this is usually our priority:  First we live, then if there is any left over we save some and occasionally, we reach into our wallets and give a little away.

Now you may be more intentional about saving and giving, but if you’re like most people you save and give from what’s left over.  But here’s why that’s a problem.  If saving and giving are afterthoughts for you, if saving and giving are you last priorities what that means is that you are robbing from your own future, and if you are a Christian, robbing from God’s kingdom.  Think about it.  When you put saving and giving last you hurt yourself in the future and withhold from God’s kingdom now.  Is that the wise thing to do with God’s money?

Let me just say something to Christians this morning, and this is really going to tick some of you off, but….  It’s bad enough to chip away at our family’s future financial security by refusing to prioritize saving, but to give God our leftovers is really insulting.  Liz, my wife, is an amazing cook.  I love good food, and Liz is always fixing good food.  Many times we have stuff left over.  I love eating leftovers from what Liz cooked.  I look forward to looking in the fridge at lunch time and seeing last night’s leftover’s there.  My insides scream, “YES” when I see leftovers.  In spite of that, Liz has never prepared an awesome meal the day before we had company with the intent of serving our guest leftovers.  She wouldn’t dream of doing that.  Instead, she pulls out all the stops and fixes some of her best dishes when we have guests.

Here’s the deal:  If we wouldn’t serve our guests leftovers, why would I give God my leftover money?  The same is true of you:  If you wouldn’t serve your guests leftovers, why would you give God your leftover money?  It’s like saying to God, “Um, sorry, Lord, I wish I could do more, but I can’t because I spent all of it on me.”  When we, as Christians, as followers of Jesus, refuse to prioritize giving, it’s like praying, “Heavenly Father, I don’t really need your involvement in my finances.  I can handle that arena all by myself.  Amen.”

On the other hand, when we give to God’s kingdom it is an invitation for God to involve himself in our finances.  Don’t take my word for it.  Throughout scripture God promises to respond to generous people.  Look at a few of these passages:

Jesus said, “Give and it will be given to you.  A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap.  For the measure you use, it will be measured to you” (Luke 6:38).

In Malachi 3:10 it states:  “Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house.  Test me in this, says the Lord Almighty, and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you will not have room enough for it.”

God responds to generosity.  Now let me say this:  I’m not saying that if you give, God is going to make you rich.  I already said that I don’t think you being rich is really a priority to God, but giving is an invitation for God to become active in the world of our personal finances.

How we manage God’s money is also a heart issue.  That’s why Jesus said in Matthew 6:  ²¹For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

So how does a wise person respond to this?  How does a wise person reorder/reprioritize their finances in light of this?  What is the wise thing for you to do with the money God has given you?  A wise person flips the order.

If you have your Bible’s open them up to Matthew 6.  This passage we’re going to look at this morning is part of what is called Jesus’ sermon on the mount.  In it Jesus gives really the basics of what it means to be his follower.  And if you’ve ever read this, Jesus’ expectations seem so unrealistic, so impractical.  We’re left asking, “How in the world can I live this way?  This is too hard Jesus.  Did you really mean this?”  But really, if you really believe God is who he said he is and that he will do all that he’s promised to do, then Jesus’ words make perfect sense.

What Jesus talks about in this passage we’re going to read is a different perspective on money.  And let me warn you, this might be hard to swallow.  But if we take what Jesus says seriously, then I believe these words have the ability to completely reorder our thinking about money, our finances and our pursuit of wealth.

Our Heavenly Father, your Heavenly Father, the one who loves you and made you and wants to have an intimate relationship with you cares very much about our needs and our desires.  In fact, what we’re about to read shows that God is committed to meeting our practical earthly needs.

²⁵“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? Be honest.  Your tendency and my tendency is to worry.  We worry about finances and paying bills and getting this or that.  We worry about money.  Did you know that worry stems from a lack of trust in God?  Worry and trust are polar opposites.  You can’t worry and trust God at the same time.  It’s not possible.  And when we worry about money it’s like we’re saying,  “I know you’re God and I’m supposed to trust you, and I do to go to heaven, or I do want you to keep me safe, but about money…I just can’t.”  And so we worry because we don’t trust God.  This lack of trust shows itself in the way we prioritize our finances.  So what we do is we live first, save second and give third.  We prioritize our wants, wishes and needs and if there’s anything leftover we give it to God.  See, I think one of the reasons people get mad when we talk about money is because we have a trust problem.  We trust our ability to handle our finances instead of trusting God to meet our needs.  But Jesus says, “do not worry.”  And then come some examples:

²⁶Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? ²⁷Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life? Worrying isn’t going to help you any.

²⁸“And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. ²⁹Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. ³⁰If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? ³¹So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear? Now check this out, this is like a below the belt punch from Jesus:

³²For the pagans run after all these things, The pagans were those people who didn’t know God, they didn’t know that he made them and loves them and cares for them and wants to know them. and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. ³³But here’s Jesus prescription, here’s where we find the answer to “in light of my past financial experience, current financial situation and future financial hopes and dreams, what is the wise thing to do with God’s money?”: seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.

Did you catch that?  Seek first the Kingdom of God.  Jesus is telling us that we need to reverse our order.  Instead of putting the kingdom of God last, Jesus commands us to put it first, and if we do that, if we prioritize giving to God’s kingdom, he makes a promise, “and all these things will be given to you as well.”  Do you know what “all these things” are?  They are all the stuff of life that we pursue to the neglect of God’s kingdom.  “All these things” is what we eat, where we live, what we wear.  It’s all the stuff that consumes the majority of our financial resources.

Essentially, Jesus is offering you and offering me a deal.  He’ll take care of our needs if we’ll prioritize His kingdom.  If we transfer our concern to what’s important to him, he will take responsibility for what is important to us.  Can you see the significance here?  Seeking him first with our money is an invitation for his intervention and involvement in the financial arena of our lives.

So what does this look like?  If you’re here this morning and you want to experience financial freedom.  You want to be the recipient of Jesus’ promise that “all these things will be added to you as well.”  If you want to know, what is the wise thing to do as it relates to my finances?  Then here’s how you do that:  You need to flip the order of what you do with your money:  You need to give first, save second, and live third.

Number 1:  You need to give first.  Since giving to God’s kingdom invites God into your finances then the first check you ought to write after you get paid is to support God’s kingdom.  I call this priority giving.  The first check we write should be to God’s kingdom.  It should be a priority.  This is how you seek first his kingdom with your money.  When you give first it’s like saying, “Heavenly Father, I want to make sure your kingdom is fully funded so I’m going to give to you first and then I’m going to live on the leftovers.”

Give before you spend.  But you ask, “how much?”  Jesus never gives us a percentage, but Jesus came from a tradition where a percentage was expected.  That percentage was called a tithe.  A tithe is 10 %.  10 % is a small price to pay to get God in the mix, besides, as I said earlier, it’s all His anyway.  But let me say this, maybe your unsure or unconvinced about 10 % or you think it might be too much of a stretch.  Well, then pick a lower percentage, start off with 1%, but make sure you choose a percentage.  It’s important that we are percentage givers.

Now some of you in here right now are really struggling financially.  Every month you can barely make the minimum payment on your credit cards.  And what you’re wondering is:  Should I wait to begin giving until after I’ve paid off all my debts?  Here’s my answer to that question:  Do you want God to help you now, or after you’ve paid off all your debt?  Remember, being generous is an invitation for God to get involved in your finances.  And what if, what if you were to prioritize giving, what if you were to commit to giving a percentage, right off the bat?  What could God do with your debt?  Don’t you think that the God who created the heavens and the earth just might be able to help out in the realm of your finances?

Give first.  Make giving a priority.  Give a percentage.  Some of you can and should give more than 10%.  And if you think I’m just after your money, then here’s my challenge:  Don’t give to Hub City.  Pick another church.  But give first.

Second:  What’s the wise thing to do once you have funded God’s kingdom?  Fund your own.  Save.  The second check you need to write every month is a check to yourself.  Specifically, you need to put some money in savings.  Again I would tell you to pick a percentage, even if it’s just 2 or 3 percent.  Pay yourself second.  You know this, but when you put money into savings, you take it out of circulation.  Circulating, easy to get to money quickly evaporates.  That’s why we rarely have any money left over to save at the end of the month.  So what is the wise thing to do?  Fund your future at the beginning of the month.

Third:  Live.  Finally, we get to the item that we usually do first.  Once you have given and saved then you get to live off the leftovers.

Now before you start throwing things at me and before you decide you’re never coming back here again let me ask you this:  What if you had been prioritizing this way for the past five years?  Think about how much money you would have saved.  Think of the extra cash you would have if you weren’t constantly juggling credit card bills.  What I’m sharing with you isn’t the easy thing to do, but it is the wise thing to do.

In light of your past experience, in light of your current circumstances, in light of your future hopes and dreams, isn’t it time for us to reprioritize our finances?

Let me tell you what I want you to do.  Try it out for three months.  Just three months.  Write your first check to God’s kingdom.  Write your second check to yourself and then live on the rest.  Give it three months and at the end of three months evaluate the results.  If you do this I believe that you will discover that God is true to his promise.  If you seek first his kingdom, if you walk wisely, then all the other things we have a tendency to worry about will be taken care of.

Here’s the sermon transcript from this past Sunday.  I want to give credit to Andy Stanley for first introducing me to the truths in this sermon.

Well, here we are in part three of Fool Proof and I’d like to begin by making some of you very uncomfortable, and if this is your first time in church and you’ve already decided, “No matter what this guy says, I’m not going to do it.”  Well, here’s your first test.  I would like for all of us to take off our watches.  Take your watch off and please play along.  If someone next to you isn’t doing it then look at them like, “What’s up with you?”  Let’s all take our watches off, and now, this is the really uncomfortable part, I want you to put it someplace where you can’t see it during the entire sermon.  Now if you think that’s scary, I’m going to put mine where I can’t see it for the entire sermon.  How about that?  I know some of you have your cell phones, put those away where you can’t check.

This is what I want you to do:  For the next few minutes I want you to trust me with some of your time.  Because, what we’re going to talk about today is how we spend our time.

Now during the message, if you’re like most people, at some point, out of habit you will look at your empty wrist and be frustrated and you’ll be trying to find your watch and trying to peek, and that’s understandable, but my point in making you do that is to focus us on this subject because there is something more important than knowing what time it is.  What’s more important is knowing how you’re spending your time.  Many, many times during the day we check to see what time it is, but not enough times do we check to see how we’re spending our time.  So, the question for us is, how are we spending our time?

Now in this series what we’ve said is this:  The goal is to fool proof our lives.  The goal is to live our lives in such a way that we look back with very little or no regret.  And we’ve said that one of the things that helps us do that is by asking the best question of all.  And the best question of all is:  What is the wise thing to do?  Not, what is everybody else doing, not what is the moral thing, not what is the legal thing, not where is the line.  The question is, for me, not for everybody because we’re all different, the question is what is the wise thing to do?  We need to ask this question of every invitation, every opportunity, every time we spend money, in our profession, when we’ve got ethical or moral decisions to make, what is the wise thing to do?

And we’ve said we need to ask this question at different levels.  We’re to ask it this way:  In light of my past experience, what is the wise thing for me to do?  In light of my current circumstances, what is the wise thing for me to do?  In light of my future hopes and dreams, what is the wise thing for me to do?  Remember, nobody has this unique combination of past, present and future that you do.  Which means, this is the grid through which I need to evaluate all of my personal decisions because I am unique and so are you.  What is the wise thing to do?

Now I don’t think there is any other area where this is possibly more important than in the arena of our time, maybe money, but we’ll talk about that next week.  But in terms of general places to apply this principle I can’t think of any more critical or any more central arena than our time.  Because your time equals your life, right?

See if people would watch me or watch you from a different planet they may assume that money and stuff equals life, but we know better than that.  Really, our time equals our life.  You can run out of stuff, but still have some life left.  But you can’t run out of time and still have life left.  When your time is over, your life is over.  Therefore, our time equals our life.

And basically you’re like me, you look back at different stages of your life and you ask yourself, “What did I do with my time?” Liz and I look back and wonder, “What did we do with all of our time before we had kids?  What were we doing with all that extra time?  I should have a PhD.  We should have more money in the bank.  We could have had 3 jobs a piece.  I mean, if I could take all the time we spend on our kids and all the money we spend on our kids, I look back and think, “Where did all that time go?”  But I don’t have an answer for that.

Some of you are single, and I promise you you’re going to one day look back on this period of your life, and some of you are thinking I want to be looking back soon, but one day you’ll be looking back on this situation and think, “What did I do with my time?  I don’t think I’ve got anything to show for it.  I’ve got an education.  I may have saved a few bucks, and I downloaded a few thousand songs, but it seems to me when I look back at all that time, I should have done something with it.”

At some point we’re going to look back and wonder, “Where did it go?”  And essentially we’re asking this:  Where did my life go?  Where did my 20’s go?  Why don’t I have more to show from my 30’s?  Why don’t I have more to show from my 40’s?  What was I doing with my time/with my life?  That’s when we discover, looking back, that the most important question is not what time is it?  That’s easy.  The more important question would be:  What am I doing with my time?

And to help us figure that out we need to begin asking this question:  In light of my past experience, current circumstances and future hopes and dreams, what is the wisest way to spend, invest my time.

Now I want us to look at five statements about time this morning, and maybe you’re here this morning and you’re not a Christian, or you’re not religious, or you’ve got questions or you don’t know what you believe but you’re just here because somebody drug you here.  This is a great Sunday to be here because 80% of this sermon is somewhat intuitive and you’ll shake your head and go “yeah, I can agree with that,” then in a few minutes we’re going to look at an incredibly relevant verse of Scripture that says something about time that I think we’ll all be able to latch on to.  Because the good news is your heavenly father, who gave you the moments and minutes and hours and weeks and years that you live, you’re heavenly father, who’s given you an allotment of time, cares very much how you spend/waste/invest your time.

But I want you to fill in some blanks and take a few notes.  And the reason I did this is because I want you to have something that you can take home and review.  This is something you can teach in your office and will go “Wow, he’s smart, or she was really helpful.”  I learned this from somebody else.  You can take credit for it, in fact, you can improve it and take credit for it.  Now I’m going to give you some statements so we can figure out how to make wise use of our time. So here we go:

Number 1:  There is a cumulative value in investing small amounts of time in certain activities over a long period. The most obvious illustration of this is in the realm of exercise, right?  There is a cumulative value in exercising for twenty minutes a day or every other day.  That at the end of six months or a year you can look back and go, wow.  No  one 20 minute period of time made that much of a difference, but the cumulative value of all of those periods of exercise stretched over months or stretched over years, boy there’s incredible value to that.

The same is true in terms of practicing something.  If you’re trying to learn an instrument, or you’re trying to perfect your golf swing.  You know that a little bit of time every week or every few days for six months or a year drastically improves your ability in that certain area.  There is a cumulative value to little bits of time invested along the way over a period of time.

Same is true in your marriage:  That a little bit of investment every day, in terms of time, over time there’s a cumulative value.  Same with kids, investing a few minutes a day with your kids.  In your spiritual life, a few minutes a day with your heavenly father, a few minutes a day in prayer, being involved in a Hub group every week, serving on a regular basis, there is a cumulative value to certain things in life.  That at the end six months, at the end of a year, at the end of three or four years our lives have been enriched.  Not because of any one event.  Not because of any one hour of time, but because of the cumulative value over a period of time.

Now the interesting thing about this is that there is actually very little value at all in any one of those deposits, right?  I mean, exercising one time is only going to make you sore.  Eating dinner with your family once in a week and then ignoring them for three or four months, there’s no cumulative value in that one dinner.  The same is true having one quiet time or going to church only once a year.  In fact, if you are a once or twice a year church person, I can understand why you wouldn’t come back because if you only come once or twice a year then there’s not really much to take from one or two church visits a year.

Number 1:  There is a cumulative value in investing small amounts of time in certain activities over a long period.

Number 2:  Neglect has a cumulative effect as well. Isn’t that true?  Neglect has a cumulative effect as well.  If you set a goal to neglect your marriage for a year, you write on a card, “I will neglect my marriage every day, well there may be some exceptions, but at least five days a week, I will neglect my marriage.”  If that was your goal, neglect has a cumulative effect as well.  At the end of three months or six months, possibly six days, there would be an effect, right?  It’s not a value, it’s not something we want, but there’s an effect.

If you decide, “I’m going to ignore my health for a solid year.  That’s my New Year’s resolution.  I’m just going to neglect my health completely.”  At the end of that year you would have something to show for it, wouldn’t you?  There would be an effect.  Now this is very important.  We are going somewhere with this.  Neglect your children.  At the end of the year there would be an effect.  If you’re in college:  Neglect your school work and at the end of the semester there is going to be an effect.  The point is this:  Neglecting any of the important arenas of life, that is, not giving them those time deposits over a long period of time, there is an effect there as well.  It wouldn’t necessarily be something we value, but at the end of that time you would have something to show for it.  There would be something there or there would be something missing.

Number 3:  There are rarely immediate consequences for neglecting single installments of time in any particular arena of life. And this is what’s so deceiving:  There are rarely any immediate consequences for neglecting single installments of time.  This is why it’s so easy for us to miss our exercise routine, right?  “Oh, I’m not going to run tomorrow.  I’m not going to work out this morning.”  And you know what, you don’t work out one day, it’s no big deal.  You get off your diet one day, no big deal.  You skip one class, no big deal.  You miss one dinner with your family because you have to work late, no big deal.  Any single installment of time isn’t that big of a deal.  Unless it’s a birthday or an anniversary, this one thing isn’t really all that important.  Nothing comes apart.  The wheels don’t fall off.  Your marriage doesn’t fall apart.  There is no one event that is so strategic that if we miss it there’s a huge consequence.

But this is how we talk ourselves out of things all the time, isn’t it?  “Oh, that doesn’t matter.  It’s just once, it’s no big deal.”

Number 4:  Here’s where this principle starts to get really focused and we can begin to understand the significance of this.  Number 4:  There is no cumulative value in the urgent things we allow to interfere with what’s most important. Here’s what I mean by that:  For all of you who decided last year or last week that you were going to exercise regularly, and you haven’t.  I mean, you signed up at the gym.  You bought a treadmill.  You got the whole library of PX90 on DVD.  You announced to everyone what you were going to do.  I mean, this was your year.  The year of health.  Your remember that?  You’re going, “Yeah, why did you bring that up?”  But you remember that.  And you haven’t done it.  If I were to sit down with you one on one and ask you this question it would be hard for you to answer.  What if I asked, “What did you do instead?”  “Um, I don’t know, I just didn’t.  All I know is what I didn’t do, not what I did do.”  “Well think about it.  Did you sleep in a few mornings?”  “Yeah, that’s it.  I got a few extra hours of sleep.  Well, actually I didn’t because I stayed up two extra hours, so I really lost an hour of sleep.”  “Well, what else did you do?”  “I read the newspaper.”  Good.  What else did you do?  “Um, on a few mornings I had breakfast with some friends.”  So here’s the point:  You stack up over here all the stuff that you did instead of exercising, and if you add it all up you know what you end up with?  It all adds up to zero.  There is no and there is never any cumulative value to all the things we do instead of things we know are important.

This is true for spending time with your kids.  The same is true in dating your wife if you’re married.  The same is true in practicing to learn an instrument or a sport.  Instead of all the time practicing, what did you do instead of practice?  “I don’t know.  I don’t even know what I did.  The time’s gone, but I don’t have anything to show for the time.  If I spend 30 minutes a day or four hours a week I would have something to show for the time.  But you see, there is no cumulative value to the urgent things that take the place of the important things.

This is why all of us look back on some period of our life and ask, “Where did it go?  Why don’t I have anything to show for it?”  Did you know that there is incredible cumulative value to spending time daily in this book and praying?  There is incredible cumulative value in that.  For those of you who want to start having a quiet time or start reading your Bible or start spending some time alone with God, but you haven’t.  If I were to ask you what you did instead and you were to add up all the what you did instead, there’s nothing to show for that, especially when compared to what could be true inside of you if in fact that had been the five or ten or fifteen minute habit of every morning of your life.  There is often no cumulative value in the urgent things that replace the important things.  That’s why we look back with regret.

All of our time gets spent.  You can’t save up your time.  It all gets spent, but it hasn’t been used in such a way as to bring maximum value to our life.

There is no cumulative value when we let the urgent things replace the important things.  That’s just a principle.  It’s true whether you believe it or not.  That why how we use our time is so incredibly important.

Number 5:  In the critical arenas of life, you cannot make up for lost time. In the critical arenas of life, you cannot make up for lost time.  Whereas in school you can pull an all nighter and pass a test, in the critical arenas of life there are no all-nighters.  You cannot cram for a relationship with your kids.  You cannot cram for a relationship with your spouse.  You cannot cram for a relationship with your heavenly father.  You cannot cram and be in shape physically and healthy.  You just can’t.  The important areas of life require small deposits all along the way and if you miss those opportunities you cannot make up for them.

We’ve all done this physically at one time or another.  You ever been through one of those seasons when you haven’t exercised for a long time and you’re going to make up for it?  So you have like a four hour workout.  And you’re smart enough to know, this isn’t the way to do this.  But there’s something in you that causes you think, “I’m going to punish myself for all those weeks I missed and somehow I’m going to run so far, do twice the amount of weights, run 12 miles, I’m going to go so hard that my body is somehow going to make up for that lost time.  How dumb?  We end up hurting ourselves.  We can’t move for days.  So you miss more days of exercise.  Then you think, “I don’t even like exercise.  It hurts.”

But isn’t it true that there’s something in us that thinks:  I can make up for lost time.  But here’s the truth:  In the key, important arenas of life you cannot make up for lost time.

If you neglect your marriage for 5 or 6 months or longer, a weekend a way will not make up for it.  I don’t care how many flowers you bring.  I don’t care how much romance you intend.  You just can’t make up for lost time relationally.  You say, “Well I haven’t been to church in three months, so after we’re done here today I’m going to go to three different church services.

Now I know I’m being silly, but this is why this is so critical:  All of us are at a stage in our life, you may be a teenager, you may be a college student, you may be single, you may be a newlywed, you may be married with young kids, you may be married with teenagers, you could be divorced and remarried with a blended family, but we’re in all different stages and these stages are temporary.  They’re all temporary.  So here’s the deal:  If we are not making the daily, every other day, weekly deposits, then we cannot make up for the cumulative value we lose in the future.  It is gone forever.  And yes, you can always start and do the from-here-on-out.  That’s important.  Hopefully, today will be a for-here-on-out for some of you in certain arenas of life.  But you cannot make up for lost time in key areas.  It’s worth trying sometime.  It’s worth sending more flowers and writing more letters and doing double duty from here on out.  But that’s all an investment in the future.  You can’t really make up for lost time because in the key areas of life there is a cumulative value in small weekly, daily, monthly deposits along the way.

Now probably nobody here would argue with that.  Maybe my applications don’t suit you, but you don’t have to be a spiritual person or a Christian to agree with what I’ve said.  It’s like “duh”.  But here’s the deal.  We as Christians believe that the Bible teaches that God has numbered our days.  In other words, there are a certain number of days that I get and I don’t know what it is.  And in these numbers of days God wants me to get maximum impact out of my life because he wants me to live my life in a way that reflects well on him.  And wasting my time, throwing my time away and chasing all the urgent things in life is not a way to maximize my life and maximize my time and it’s not for you.  And none of us want to do that anyway.

Since your heavenly father knows that your days are numbered and wants you to get maximum impact relationally and spiritually and professionally out of your life.  What would you expect him to say in light of this truth that we’ve just unpacked about time and the way we use our time?  You would expect him to be pretty direct.  And so, in fact, he is.

And so today, I want us to look back at the passage that we began this series with.

Ephesians 5:15  This is what the Apostle Paul says and we’ll put it up on the screen for you in case you didn’t bring a Bible.  And it’s so interesting, of all the areas that Paul could have chosen to apply this whole idea of wisdom, he chose to apply it to this specific arena of our time.  Be very careful, then, how you live – not as unwise but as wise, (And then look at his application.  He could have gone to morality.  He could have gone to parenting.  He could have gone to our spiritual lives.  But look what he says.) making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil.

That little phrase, making the most of every opportunity, literally means to “redeem the time” which means to get maximum value.  It’s a word that’s used in accounting contexts in the first century.  Get maximum value, that is:  Squeeze everything you can out of every moment you live.  Get maximum value out of your time.  Take every opportunity to wring value out of your time.  And if you’re not wise, the implication is, that won’t happen.  Remember the phrase, because the days are evil.  That is, you and I live in a time, and we talked about this a few weeks ago, but we live in a day and age where if we allow it to, the urgency of life will steal our time.  We’ll spend all of our time doing all of the urgent things and we’ll miss the opportunity to invest in those things that are most important.  We’ll miss the opportunity to give the daily, the weekly, the 10 minute, the 30 minute deposits of time to the relationships that are most important and we’ll miss out on the potential cumulative value of getting to the end of our 20’s or our 30’s or our 40’s or our 50’s and saying, “Wow, look how richer I am relationally, look at how much richer I am spiritually, look at how much richer I am professionally, not because of a day, not because of a moment, not because of a 4 hour workout, but because I made the incremental deposits all along the way.

Redeem the time.  Get maximum value.  Take advantage of every opportunity.  Because if you don’t, we live in a day and age, we live in evil times when the urgency of things around us will steal our time and will use it all up.  We will just be very, very busy and not have anything to show for it.  Redeem the time.

So think about the best question ever:  What is the wise thing for you to do with your time?  In light of your past, your present and your future hopes and dreams, what’s the wise way to invest your time?  In light of your past, your present and your future, what do you need to stop doing?  Not because it’s bad, that’s why this whole principle is so valuable, not because it’s bad, but because it’s robbing from you the opportunity to make those incremental investments into what is most important.  It’s robbing you of the cumulative value of doing the right thing, the right number of times.

What’s the wise thing to do?  In light of your past experience, let’s talk about that:  In light of your past experience what is the wise thing to do?  Some of you grew up in homes that were incredible homes.  Your family was perfect growing up.  Everything was kind-of wonderful and you look back on your family life, you look back on how your parents prioritized, and you are reaping the results of the cumulative value of those deposits of time, but as you look at the way you are conducting your family and your marriage you realize that you’re not following in their example.  And in light of your past experience you know how you ought to be conducting yourself.  You know how you should be conducting relationships.  In light of your past….  Some of you came out of homes that were highly dysfunctional.  Everybody’s gone.  Everybody’s fragmented.  Everybody’s off in 20 different directions, and you look at your own family and realize that is how it is with you.  And you know where that leads.  You know that’s not the kind of family you want to have.  You know that doesn’t lead to the kind of relationships that you want to have.  You’ve seen where that goes.  You know what that does to you on the inside.  So in light of your past experience, what’s the wise thing to do now with how you allot your time?

Let’s ask it about now?  In light of what’s going on right now, how do you need to spend your time?  In light of what’s going on right now in your current responsibilities what do you need to stop doing?  What do you need to begin doing on a daily basis, a monthly basis?  What do you need to do to begin to develop that investment into things that matter for a lifetime?  Cause here’s the deal, you’re at a specific stage of life, you won’t always be in college, you won’t always be a newlywed, you won’t always have kids in diapers, you won’t always have teenagers, in other words, whatever stage of life you are in right now, this is a very narrow stage of life.  So in light of what you have going on right now, what’s the wisest way to spend your time?  Where do you need to make incremental investments so there is value down the road?  In light of what’s going on right now, I have to ask and you have to ask, what is the wise thing to do in how we spend our time?  What needs to be taken out, what needs to be put in?  What will we look back and wish we had done?  What will we look back and never regret?

And then there’s the future, in light of your future hopes and dreams, what is the wise thing to do with your time?  In light of where you want to be relationally, in light of where you want to be spiritually, in light of where you want to be professionally, in light of where you want to be financially, in light of where you want to be physically, in light of the picture that you have in your mind of what you want the future to look like, what is the wise thing to do with your time?

As you evaluate what you want in the future, what has the potential to rob you of the cumulative value so that now, because of the future, the answer is no.  Not because it’s wrong, but because it’s really not the wise thing for me to do with my time.

Remember, there are some chunks of time, there are some investments, there are some areas of neglect that you can’t ever go back and make up completely for.

Let’s go ahead and get our watches back.  And as you’re putting your watch on I want you to remember that it’s not important what time it is, it’s important what you do with your time.

Here’s what I want you to do.  I’m going to put four words on the screen and in your notes there are five lines under the fill in the blank thing that you did.  I want you to write these words as small as you can because I’m going to ask you to add something to it in a minute.  I want you to write these four words:  Physically, relationally, professionally, spiritually.  And as you’re writing them down let me give you your assignment.  As we end I’m going to give you exactly one minute to write down one thing you could begin doing in each of these areas.  One thing you could begin doing in each of these areas that you believe would have a positive cumulative effect on your future.

In other words, what could you do physically, that if you’d just do it every day, every few days, every week, that in six months or a year you would look back and say “that was a great investment of my time.”  What could you begin doing relationally?  It could be with the person you date, it could be a best friend, a child, a spouse.  What could you begin doing on a regular basis, just a small investment of time daily, weekly, monthly that you believe would have cumulative value in the future?  What could you do in the same way professionally?  And then what could you do spiritually?  Or it might be what could you continue doing, because some of you look at these and go, “I’ve got two of these right, but I’m struggling with the other two.”  And some of you look at these and go, “I’ve got a lot of work to do.”  What could you do in each of these areas that if you were to do it consistently there would be cumulative value over an extended period of time?

Remember this, the big question isn’t what time is it?  It’s what are you doing with your time?  And would you have the courage to ask, “Heavenly father, give me the wisdom to know how to invest my time.”