MONDAY: LORDSHIP & PRIORITIES
KEY PASSAGE
“No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.” Matthew 6:24
DEVOTIONAL
Your master matters.
God innately and intentionally created each of us to worship. It isn’t a matter of IF you worship but WHO you worship. The “who” doesn’t always mean someone, it often can take the form of something. Jesus warns people, more than any other thing, about the entangling nature of money. In Matthew 6:24, Jesus explicitly declares that you cannot serve, or worship, both God and money. Why? Because money is meant to serve you, not to be served.
In Matthew 13:22, Jesus paints the picture of the effect that the “deceitfulness of wealth” can have on the word of God planted in your heart. He explains that it is like thorns that grow among the word and choke it out. And the longer we allow thorns to be our master the longer we live under pain and disappointment.
However, when we trust God with our ENTIRE lives, including our finances, and make Him our master, we have the opportunity to live in abundance in every area of our lives. Why? Because God, who is able to do exceedingly and abundantly above any other thing in this universe, is willing and wanting to provide for His children.
Your master matters because the makeup of your life depends on it. Whatever you serve will ultimately shape you.
CHALLENGE
1. IDENTIFY - What do you spend yourself (your time, money, energy, etc.) on? Where you spend is where you serve.
2. RECLAIM - Exercise obedience and self-control in any area where your money may have taken the driver seat by delaying a purchase, blessing someone, etc.
3. PRAY - “God, I choose to make you my master today in all ways. Order my priorities and direct my decisions today. In Jesus’ name, Amen.”
TUESDAY: STEWARDSHIP + OWNERSHIP
KEY PASSAGE
Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God’s grace in its various forms.
DEVOTIONAL
What has God given you that you can give to others? Peter wrote this letter to the church to encourage them in their faith in the midst of persecution. He gave them practical instruction for living Godly lives. Peter is communicating in this verse that God has given each person a gift. What does this mean? Ephesians 2:10 says, “for we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” Our Heavenly Father crafted and created each of us with an individual purpose to serve others and use the gift to glorify God.
Your gifts were never meant to be kept for yourself, but to be given away. The gift God has given you is a unique gift. This means that God never intended for you to compare your gifts with others, but to operate in the gift that God has given you.
Whether your gift is encouragement, teaching, hospitality, organization, crafting, or even just being a faithful friend to others, each of these gifts are an extension of God’s grace. You are called to be a good steward of the grace that God has given to you. Grace is the unmerited favor of God and as Christ followers we have the opportunity to extend God’s grace through our gifting. So, when you use your creativity for God’s glory it is an extension of God’s grace. When you make a meal for your neighbor you are extending God’s grace. When you pray with someone you are giving the grace of God away. When you help a friend repair something that is broken in their home, you are an extension of God’s grace. Let’s be good stewards of God’s grace through the gifts that God has given each of us today.
CHALLENGE
Take a few minutes to reflect on the grace that God has given you. Read Ephesians 2:8-9.
Look at the ways God has naturally gifted you, what are you good at?
How can you use this gift to serve others and bring God glory?
WEDNESDAY: STEWARDSHIP + OWNERSHIP (2)
KEY PASSAGE
DEVOTIONAL
What has God given you? Many of your answers would probably be a job, a home, a family, friends and your church family. Those are all really good answers, but the true answer is EVERYTHING. Everything we have comes from God. It is all His! If everything we have and everything we are belongs to God then that means He is the owner. The owner is the one who gets to decide how it is used. So, what does that make us? Stewards. A steward is someone who is entrusted with the management of someone else’s business or assets.
In this parable, we read about a man who was going on a journey and it says in verse 14, “who called his servants and entrusted his wealth to them.” This verse shows that the servants were the stewards of their master’s money. Each servant was given a different amount. One received five bags, one received three, and another received one bag. They were each given according to their abilities. Two of the servants were wise with stewarding their master’s money by putting it to work and returning to their master with double the money he had given them. But, the third servant dug a hole and buried the bag of gold until he returned. This servant did little to nothing with his master’s money. He took care that it wouldn’t get lost, but he did nothing productive with it.
God desires for us to be faithful and trustworthy stewards of what He has entrusted to us. He is a generous giver (James 1:17) who expects a faithful return on His investment. The bags of gold in this parable should be seen as the life resources we have been given—time, money, abilities and authority. So, the question is: When you look at your life resources, how are you stewarding what God has given you?
CHALLENGE
Take out a piece of paper and answer these two questions for each category:
How have I used my ____________ (time, money, ability, authority)?
How can I honor God with my ____________ (time, money, ability, authority)?
Pray and reflect on each of these categories and sense what God is leading you to do in response.
THURSDAY: TITHE
KEY PASSAGE
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 there will not be room enough to store it.
DEVOTIONAL
What if I told you: tithing is not a financial practice, it is a spiritual one?
For many of us, we feel as though if we can get a firm grip on our finances, budget to the last dime, and stop buying Starbucks, then we can truly experience financial peace.
However, we often fail to realize that - while all of these things are good - we may have placed more trust in our own power than in God’s provision.
The action of tithing is giving back the first 10% of your income to the Lord through the “storehouse” you are a part of - the local church you call home. For us, placing our faith in God with 10% can seem daunting and even potentially disabling. However, the good news is: God can always do more with our 10% than we ever could with 100%. In fact, God actually challenges us to “test him in this”.
When we choose to participate in the faith challenge of tithing, entrusting God with a portion of what He has first entrusted us with, God will never leave us without. Maybe this year is the year you decide to trust God with your finances in this practice. Faith, in every area of our lives, is a muscle in need of exercising and stretching. Tithing is a great place to work your faith muscle.
CHALLENGE
1. Begin with something - though 10% is the biblical standard, starting with something out of the abundance of a joyful heart is more than enough to get you going.
2. Believe for something - in God’s kingdom, with every seed sown comes a harvest to be reaped. The harvest could look like your seed turning into a blessing for someone else or a blessing returned to you. Either way, entrust God with the seed and trust God for the harvest.
3. Between you and God– ask him what your next step in the giving process is. And ask him for the courage to take this next step.
FRIDAY: GREED
KEY PASSAGE
“Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; a man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.” Luke 12:15
DEVOTIONAL
A man from the crowd makes a request of Jesus: “Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me” (Luke 12:13). It sounds like a reasonable request, asking Jesus to intervene in a dispute between brothers. The man brought his request to the right place, but Jesus sees the deeper issue with the request. It is a heart issue: greed.
Greed is defined as “an excessive, selfish desire for more (money, power, possessions) that becomes idolatry, leading people away from God and causing harm.” Greed is a dangerous position of the heart towards God and towards others. Jesus warns the crowd to be on guard against all kinds of greed because this is not where full life is found.
Jesus drives home the message by sharing a parable about a rich man who had narrowed vision. He was focused on building more for himself (tearing down his old barns and building bigger ones) so that he could store up all of his wealth and possessions and enjoy his life.
The problem with acting like this rich man, is that greed keeps us craving more (money, power, possessions) and we fall for the lie that once we finally get more, that it will be enough. But, in truth, it will never be enough because the selfish desire for more will never satisfy a hungry soul. We are looking for personal security when we store up these things in our barns, but these things will never bring protection for our souls.
As Christ followers, we are instructed in Mark 12:30-31 of two things: First, to love God with our whole heart, soul, mind and strength and the second, is to love your neighbor as yourself. When we are filled with greed, we have a displaced love for God and for our neighbors.
CHALLENGE
What request have you made to God today? Based on your request, is God seeing a deeper issue, a heart issue?
Journal your answers to these 2 questions today:
Where am I tempted to store up security for myself apart from God?
How is my love toward God and how am I doing with loving my neighbor?
Prayer: God, I come to you today and ask that you take a look at my heart. I ask that you free me from any false beliefs that possessions will give me what only you can provide. Help me remember that the “more” that I am in search of is only found in you. Amen.