CAIN AND ABEL—SELFISHNESS AND SACRIFICE

	Well, welcome once again to The Journey.  I’m glad you chose to be here with us today, those of you who are in Jersey City, and those of you here in Midtown Manhattan, because we are kicking off a brand new teaching series called Cain and Abel.  And over the next three weeks, we are going to be looking at the lives of the very first brothers that we find in the Bible.  Cain and Abel.  In fact, we find the story of their lives in the forth book of the Bible, in Genesis chapter four.  And over the next three weeks, we are going to be looking at their lives.  And through their lives, we are going to be looking at three decisions, three choices, that each of us has to face each and every day of our lives.  And how we respond to the choices in these areas, every day of our life, is going to determine whether or not we become the person that we want to be, or whether our lives are just going in a backwards direction.  We are going to look at the choices between being stubborn and being obedient.  The choice between making excuses and taking responsibility.  Today we are going to kick off the series by looking at the choice we face between living a selfish life and between living a life of sacrifice.  Now the story of Cain and Abel, as it is found in Genesis 4, it’s really one of the most famous stories in all of history.  If you will remember, Cain and Abel, their parents were Adam and Eve.  And Adam and Eve were the first human beings that God created.  When they were originally created, they lived in the Garden of Eden and everything was perfect for them until they made a decision to turn their backs on God.  When they did that, God cast them out of the Garden of Eden, and after that point, Adam and Eve had three sons.  They had Cain, Abel and then they had another son later on whose name was Seth.  Let’s look in Genesis 4 to find out where our story begins.  If you have your message notes, go ahead and pull those out, and the passage that we are going to read and look at today is at the top of your message notes, from Genesis 4:1-7.  And it says this, “Adam slept with his wife, Eve, and she became pregnant.  And when the time came, she gave birth to Cain, and she said ‘With the Lord’s help, I have brought forth a man.’  Later she gave birth to a second son, and named him Abel.  Now when they grew up, Abel became a shepherd while Cain was a farmer.  Now at harvest time, Cain brought to the Lord a gift of his farm produce, while Abel brought several choice lambs from the best of his flock.  The Lord accepted Abel and his offering, but He did not accept Cain and his offering.  This made Cain very angry and dejected.   ‘Why are you so angry’, the Lord asked him.  ‘Why do you look so dejected?  You will be accepted if you respond in the right way, but if you refuse to respond correctly, then watch out.  Sin is waiting to attack and destroy you, and you must subdue it.”  Now, I want you to notice what happened here.  These two brothers grew up and Cain became a farmer and Abel became a shepherd.  Now, both of these are respectable positions.  The fact that God accepted one their offerings and rejected the other, had nothing to do with their professions.  Being a farmer, being a shepherd, both are acceptable, fine professions.  But one day they both brought gifts to God, but Abel’s gift was accepted and Cain’s was rejected.  Now why was that?  I want you to notice what the Bible says.  The Scriptures said that Abel brought his gift and he brought the very best of what he had.  He was a shepherd, so he had animals.  He brought the very best from his flock.  He didn’t keep them for himself, but gave it to God.  The verse says that God was pleased, He accepted Abel’s gift and He blessed Abel as a result.  But Cain just brought an offering.  It wasn’t that Cain brought nothing, he did bring something.  But Cain made the decision that he was going to keep the very best of what he produced to himself, and he was going to give God the second best.  He kept the best for himself.  And as a result, God accepted Abel’s offering and He rejected Cain’s offering.  You probably know the rest of the story.  Cain didn’t accept that rejection very well, in fact, he became angry and he became dejected, and he became bitter, and that led to jealousy and jealousy eventually leads to the first murder in the Bible.  Where Cain murders his brother, Abel.  Now, today, we aren’t focusing on that part of the story, but instead we are focusing on the initial choice that Cain and Abel made between sacrifice and between selfishness.  The first thing we need to understand is this—this is not a story between good and evil.  This is not a story between a bad person and a good person.  Cain and Abel were both good guys.  They were regular people.  You see, you and I, by the choices that we make, we could very easily be an Abel, and we can very easily be a Cain.  And one of the choices that we all make every day is whether we are going to live a life of selfishness or whether we are going to live a life of sacrifice.  As we begin today, I want to go ahead and define for you what I mean by sacrifice.  I want you to write this down:
	Sacrifice is always giving my best to God, and to others.  Whereas, selfishness is keeping my best for myself and getting the best of others and trying to get that for myself.  Sacrifice is giving my best to God and to others.  You see, Abel chose sacrifice by giving his very best to God as an offering.  The best from his flock.  And it led to blessing in his life, being accepted by God.  But Cain, on the other hand, chose selfishness.  He chose to keep the very best for himself and because he made that choice, it led to misery.  You see, each of us, every day of our life, we get to choose the kind of life we want to live by the choices we make.  And from the story of Cain and Abel, we see there are serious consequences to whether we choose a life of selfishness or whether we choose a life of sacrifice.  Here are some of the consequences.  I want you to jot these down.  
	1.	The first consequence that we have—selfishness leads to rejection and sacrifice leads to acceptance.  Selfishness leads to rejection but sacrifice leads to acceptance.  You see, Abel chose to sacrifice and give God his best.  He was accepted by God and blessed, but Cain chose selfishness and he kept the best for himself and he was rejected by God, and his offering was, as well.  And then Cain felt the sting, the bitter sting, of rejection.  Now, I want you to hear this.  It’s just a natural fact of life that when we choose to live a life of selfishness, keeping our best for ourselves, and trying to get the best of others for ourselves, we are going to be rejected by other people.  Other people don’t want to be around people who keep the best for themselves, and are always trying to get from them without giving.  Selfishness always leads to rejection.  It leads to rejection with God because God rejects a person who is out for his or herself.  But people love to be around, and God loves to bless those who live lives of generosity.  So here’s the consequence:  selfishness leads to rejection, sacrifice leads to acceptance.  
	2.	The second consequence is this:  selfishness leads to anger.  Sacrifice leads to love.  Selfishness leads to anger, and sacrifice leads to love.  You see Abel chose to sacrifice and the love between he and God grew.  Cain chose to be selfish and God’s disappointment in his decision led to anger.  I want you to notice—Cain’s problem was never with his brother, Abel.  It was with God, yet Cain took his anger out on the person who was closest to him.  The person who was nearest to him—his brother Abel.  And I want  you to notice, it’s the same with us.  Whenever we are selfish with God, whenever we are selfish with another person and we keep the best to ourselves, and then when we are rejected, we experience the rejection, it always leads to anger.  But that anger doesn’t just go against the person who rejected us, but it spills over into every area of our lives, and it affects all of our relationships, and all of our connections, and it ends up hurting people who are innocent, around us, those who aren’t even involved.   You see the opposite of love isn’t hatred.  It’s not hatred.  The opposite of love isn’t hatred.  It’s selfishness.  Selfishness is the opposite of love because you see, selfishness expects to be served.  It expects to be protected.  It expects to be given to.  Selfishness says—serve me please.  Pay attention to me.  While love on the other hand, is just the opposite.  Love says—how can I serve you?  How can I help you?  It thinks of other people first.  So selfishness leads to rejection and anger.  Sacrifice leads to acceptance and love.  
3.	And then the third consequence is this:  selfishness leads to emptiness and sacrifice leads to fulfillment.  Selfishness leads to emptiness and sacrifice leads to fulfillment.  You see, selfish people are, by definition, devoted to bringing themselves happiness.  Right?  That’s all.  I mean, Cain made a decision to keep the best of his offering to himself, and to give God the leftovers.  He wasn’t doing that to make himself miserable, was he?  He was doing that because he thought by keeping the best to himself, he would be happy.  Selfish people, by definition, I have put there, happiness in front of everything else.  That’s what they seek after.  But here’s my question:  Why is it that the people in the world, who put their happiness as the number one thing in their lives, almost always end up as the most miserable people in the world?  While those who put the happiness of others and giving to God as the number one thing in their lives, end up being the happiest?  It’s hard to understand.  It’s hard to explain.  But I have an illustration that I want to use as an example.  I have here, two buckets.  I want these buckets to represent two different people.  This first bucket is going to represent me.  The second bucket is going to represent other people in my life.  Others, not the others from the TV show, Lost, but other people who are in our life.  And I want you to imagine going through a day.  These buckets have water in them and this water represents the emotional energy that we have when we go through our lives.  At the beginning of the day, I want you to imagine starting a day of work and your bucket is filled to the brim.  You have a lot of emotional energy to go through the day.  But you know what—things happen in life and some of that emotional energy gets lost.  Like for instance, you get up and you are a little bit late.  And you run to the train and the door closes and you miss the train and you are going to be late for work.  You get on the next train but it’s really crowded and you are standing next to someone who smells really bad and you are already having a bad day, and all this emotional energy you begin to lose.  It slowly is emptied out of the bucket.  And then you go to work and a project that you thought was already done, a co-worker lets you down and it’s not done.  And then there goes some more emotional energy and you begin to get more strained, and more strained.  And maybe the next thing that happens, I go to lunch.  Maybe I go to lunch with Pastor Nelson and we spend an hour, an hour and a half talking together.  And then there goes some more emotional energy.  My bucket just seems to get lower and lower.  And by the end of the day, I’m almost on empty and I go home.  And I face this other person.  For me, it could be my wife, Lori.  For you, it could be a co-worker; it could be a friend, or another family member.  But what’s the first thing.  They come home to, and their emotional level is almost empty.  What’s the first thing we want to do?  The first thing we want to do, is to take our dipper and to reach into their lives, get their emotional energy to fill us up.  Right?  Now, that’s a natural thing to do.  Right?  I’m on empty, I go home—take care of me.  Feed me.  Make me feel better.  So we reach in and try to take their emotional energy, which is already on empty and fill ourselves up.  But you see, that doesn’t work.  Because what happens is this—we take our dipper into their lives, and they don’t like it that much.  Because you are taking from this and it becomes the battle where you take from them, you empty them, and you don’t get it either.  And you lose it.  And you lose even more in the battle that ensues.  So both of you are losing emotional energy because you are trying to take from someone else to fill you up.  So how do you solve this problem?  Well, here’s what God says.  This is what the Bible says.  It says—when you are on empty and someone else is on empty, instead of reaching into their bucket to try to fill yourself up, the Bible says take what energy you have left, take what love you have left and pour what you have into their lives until you, yourself, are empty. You may be thinking to yourself—Kerrick, I understand how that helps them.  I’m filling their bucket up.  I just emptied myself up and I didn’t have much to start with.  What about me?  Well, here’s what God does.  You see, there is a third bucket.  And that bucket is God and what God says is—when you empty yourself into other people, I will supernaturally come into your life and I will fill your bucket up more than you ever had before.  And here’s the good thing about God’s bucket is—it’s limitless.  It doesn’t run out.  And when He pours into your life, He can fill you up as you fill another person up.  You see, that’s the secret.  If I want to be happy, if I want to be filled up, the key is to give what I have toward a person and help fill them up.  Because every time I try to take from them to fill myself up, we both end up empty.  So that’s the point here, with selfishness always leads to emptiness, but sacrifice leads to fulfillment.
4.	The forth consequence is this:  selfishness leads to sin, sacrifice leads to growth.  Selfishness leads to sin, and sacrifice leads to growth.  You see, it was Cain’s selfishness that eventually led to his sin.  When God rejected Cain’s offering, Cain was very angry with God, with life, with everything, and God came to Cain and said—why are you angry.  You know, this isn’t a surprise, you know if you choose right, you will be accepted.  You know if you choose wrong, you will be rejected.  But then, I want you to notice what God said—He says, if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door.  You see, I think it is important that we recognize this because time and time again, we say to ourselves—I know what God wants me to do, but I don’t want to do it.  So I’m not going to do it.  It’s just one small sin.  It’s just one small disobedience.  He wants me to do this.  I’m not going to do it.  But what God says here is—whenever you disobey God, a bigger sin is crouching at the door ready to jump.  And Cain’s first sin was being selfish.  It led to anger.  It led to bitterness.  It led to envy, and it eventually led to murder.  When we choose to sacrifice, to give our best to God and others, we will grow spiritually.  We will grow emotionally.  We will grow relationally in almost every area of our life.  Let me ask you this, if it’s clear that selfishness leads down a dark path to destruction and emptiness and sin, and all these things we have been talking about. . .like sacrifice leads to blessing in our lives, why is it so hard to a live a life of sacrifice.  Why is it that so many people live lives of selfishness instead of sacrifice?  Well, the answer is—it’s easier to live a life of selfishness.  It’s more natural and it’s what is expected of us.  But it will eventually lead to destruction.  
So for the remainder of our time today, I want to look at how to live a life of sacrifice.  I want to look at how to take the path less traveled.  Now, remember, even though genuine sacrifice comes in many different forms, even though it can look different across the world, every time we see sacrifice we admire it.  Like this. . .
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So how do I live a life of daily sacrifice?  There are four steps that we can take to live a life of sacrifice.  Here’s the first one.  Open up the inside of your message notes:
1.	Strive for success.  Strive for success.  Now you may be thinking—Kerrick, that seems kind of counter-intuitive.  It’s not what I expected you to say.  After all, if I am living a life of sacrifice, I shouldn’t be thinking about making it to the top of the ladder or thinking about myself at all.  I want you to understand, that that is a trap.  It’s a myth that many well-meaning followers of Jesus have fallen into.  We think living a life of sacrifice means not doing very well by way of worldly standards.  Not being successful in our industry.  Not being wealthy.  Not making it in life.  But that’s wrong handed thinking.  Look at what Paul writes in Galatians 6.  He says, “Make a careful exploration of who you are and the work you have been given.  And then think yourself into that.  Each time each of you must take responsibility for doing the created best you can with your own life.”  You see, God wants you to do the very best that you can with the life He has given you.  In every area of your life, He wants you to be successful.  Because you see, oftentimes, the sacrifice I’m talking about comes from doing the very best you can.  From doing the hard work necessary to be successful.  It takes sacrifice to be successful.  You see, it’s laziness, not success that is the sin of selfishness.  Lazy people, inherently, they are selfish.  People who are successful often have made sacrifices in order to succeed.  It’s a sin when we don’t do the very best we can with what God has given us.  You see, Abel pleased God.  I’m going back to our story.  Not because he was a mediocre shepherd.  He pleased God because he did the very best he could as a shepherd, then from the success he had, he gave God the very best of what God had blessed him with.  That was why.  Not because he was mediocre.  And for us, sacrifice comes not from living a life of mediocrity, but from living a life of excellence and then giving generously to God and others from what God has blessed you with.  You see, in our church, we have vice presidents of corporations.  Maybe they have been very successful and they have made a lot of money, they live lives of sacrifice.  I see them give back to the church.  I see them serve other people.  And because they are successful, that doesn’t mean that they are selfish.  On the other hand, I’ve been around people who are in poverty, some people who I have been around who live in poverty, they hold onto what they have so tightly that they are living a life of selfishness.  You see, whether you are selfish or you live a life of sacrifice, it has nothing to do with what you own, or where you are on the corporate ladder or in your industry.  It has nothing to do with that.  What it has to do with is, are you willing to give God the best from what He has blessed you with.  If you want to honor God the most, then work hard to be successful as you can in the field which God has called you, but on the way, be sure to serve others and that you give back to God sacrificially.  Colossians 3:23 says this, “Work hard and cheerfully at whatever you do as though you were working for the Lord, rather than for people.”  You see, I don’t want to reach the end of my life and stand before God and have God say—hey, you did okay, but this is what you could have done with what I gave you.  Instead, I want God to say—well done, I gave you this and you did everything you were successful as you possibly could have been with what I gave you, and then you gave back to others, and you gave back to Me from the very best of your life.  So I want you to understand—sacrifice doesn’t equal failure.  So even though it is counter-intuitive to live a life of sacrifice and have to strive for success.  That leads us to the second step of living a life of sacrifice, which is this:
2.	Recognize everything that I have is from God.  Recognize everything that I have is from God.  We have to admit this—we all live lives of abundance.  We live in the wealthiest country in the history of the world, and the number one temptation of abundance and wealth is selfishness.  Because you see, the more we have, the stronger our tendency to be selfish.  The stronger our tendency to hold onto it.  Now, a lot of us think—well, you know what?  I don’t have a lot now, so I’m going to be selfish with what I have, but when I get more, then I’m going to be generous and I’m going to give to others and I’m going to give back to God.  But you see, it doesn’t work that way.  Because the more  you get the harder it is to give.  Think about it.  If I have $10 and God wants me to give back 10% as tithe to the church, it’s not hard for me to give $1, if $10 is all I have, I can give $1, but if I have $1 million, it’s pretty hard to give $100,000 back to God.  You see, the more we get the more our tendency is to hold onto it and the harder it is to give.  You see, and in our lives, when God blesses us and we keep the best for ourselves, without giving it to God or others, it inevitably leads to a downfall in our lives.  That’s what happens when we forget that everything we have comes from God.  But God says that if we know the truth of the situation, we won’t fall into this trap.  In fact, look at what the Apostle Paul write in II Corinthians 2.  I want us to read this passage out loud together.  Are you ready?  It says this:  “It is not that we think we can do anything of lasting value by ourselves.  Our only power and success comes from God.”  I want you to underline that last sentence—our only power and success comes from God.  Because you see, that’s a strong statement.  We can do nothing by ourselves that has any lasting value or significance, and if there is anything good in my life, anything significant in my life, it’s there because God has given it to me.  God has brought it into my life.  Any success I have is because God has blessed me.  You see, this is called—having eternal perspective.  Understanding that God is responsible for every good thing in our lives.  So it belongs to Him.  Nothing in my life that’s good belongs to me, it’s given to me by God.  And He wants me to be a steward.  He wants me to be a keeper of it.  And this is what this means.  It means that God wants me to use what He has blessed me with to help other people, to serve other people and to give back to Him.  Not from the leftovers, but from the very best of what He has given me.  Author Howard Hendricks wrote:  When a person does not have an eternal perspective, he is more concerned with what people do for him, than what he does for Christ.  But you see, when we realize that we were created by God, and we were created for God, and everything that we have in our lives is from God, it enables us to loosen our grip around the things that own or possess.  It enables us to loosen the grip and not be selfish people.  It enables us to live sacrificial lives and to give away what God has so richly given to us.  It’s then we begin to understand what really matters in life.  James 1:17 says, “Whatever is good and perfect comes to us from God above Who created all Heaven’s lights, He never changes or casts shifting shadows.”  
So, number one—strive for success.  Remember the best sacrifice you can make in your life comes out of living a life of excellence, not a life of mediocrity.  Then number two—recognize that everything that you have is from God.  Because, like I just said, recognizing that everything that you have is from God enables you to live a life of sacrifice, enables you to give it and helps you overcome selfishness in your life.  
3.	Then number three:  seize opportunities to say “yes” to God.  Seize opportunities to say yes to God.  You see, in our story from Genesis 4, both Cain and Abel have a God moment.  They have an opportunity where God asks them to make a sacrifice, to give an offering.  That’s a tremendous opportunity.  And it’s a tremendous opportunity for them not to just make a sacrifice, but when you make a sacrifice for God, it brings God’s presence, His power, His blessing into your life.  We are blessed when we make a sacrifice.  So this God moment is an opportunity.  The Bible says that Abel seized the opportunity.  That he gave God the very best that he had.  And that God was pleased with what Abel did and He blessed him as a result.  But Cain loved the fruit of his labor more than he loved God and held onto the very best instead of giving it.  In doing so, he chose selfishness.  He let an opportunity to say yes to God, pass by.  Look at how Paul describes it in II Corinthians 9.  He says, “For God is the one who gives seeds to the farmer, and then bread to eat.  In the same way, He will give you many opportunities to do good, and He will produce a great harvest of generosity in you.”  I want you to notice this.  Just as God gives seeds to the farmer.  You know seeds have opportunity for life within them.  They have life and potential in them.  It’s an opportunity for new life to form.  Just as God gives seeds to a farmer, He gives us God moments.  He gives us God opportunities every day in our lives.  Opportunities to say yes to Him and then when we say yes, produces new life.  New life in other people that we give to and new life and opportunities in us.  However, when we turn our backs on God moments and decide to choose selfishness over sacrifice, not only do we miss out on God’s  immediate blessing in our life, not only do we forfeit that, but it becomes harder and harder for us in the future to recognize those God moments when they come into our lives.  Now this is what I mean by this—if God comes into your life and He gives you a God moment, an opportunity to make a sacrifice to give your best to other people, or to give your best to Him, we say no and we turn our back on that moment and say no to God, the next time, God will still bring God moments into our lives, but the next time it becomes harder for us to recognize it as being a God moment.  What happens is when we say no to God, our heart begins to harden.  Our eyes become unable to recognize when He is working in our lives.  The good news is, when we say yes to a God moment, every time we sacrifice when we are given the opportunity our eyes become more open to the God moments that exist around us.  You know, sometimes, we say no to God because we think when God asks us to give Him our best, we think that’s just too hard.  Or sometimes we think it’s not important enough an area for us to make a sacrifice.  But I want you to understand, when God invites you to be involved, no work is unimportant.  No sacrifice is meaningless.  You see, there is great value in doing small things.  There is great value in helping someone who is less fortunate.  Some of you today are taking part in The Journey’s clothes drive where we are collecting clothes for the less fortunate in our city and we are giving some of them to some mental hospitals in the metro New York area.  And we are giving to them because some of those patients are needy, they need clothes, and we are giving that way.  You see, even giving as little as one shirt, that you give to this donation, that is meaningful and it makes a difference.  You see, there is great value in that.  There is great value in coming to church to serve.  There is great value in saying yes to God by saying, I’m going to give You a tithe.  I’m giving you the best, the first 10% of what I make.  There is great value when you say—I’m going to step across the line and be baptized because I know that’s what God wants me to do.  When you say—I want to join and become a member of the church and join God’s spiritual family here at The Journey, I know that’s what God wants me to do.  You see, whenever we say yes to giving our best to God and to others, no matter how seemingly small that sacrifice is, we change eternity and God blesses us.  But here’s the thing—you don’t just tell God yes once.  You say yes to God every day, and at every opportunity.  You see, one of the best things that you can do when you get up in the morning, before your day begins, before you encounter any God moment, or any God opportunity, is just to get on your knees and say a quick prayer—God, before this day begins, I’m saying yes, to whatever opportunities, whatever God moment you bring into my life, the opportunity for me to give my best to others and to You, I’m saying yes now before the opportunity even comes into my life.  You see, that’s a great prayer to begin your day with.  That’s a great prayer just to say—I’ve made up my mind.  I’m not even going to be tempted to say no.  God, I’m going to say yes to whatever opportunity that you bring into my life.  In fact, if you will take a moment and you will look at your Connection Card, that I was talking about earlier, you will see on the back, the second Next Step says—say yes to God in the area of ___________.  Maybe you need to say yes to God, right now, to something you know that God is maybe speaking to your heart right now about giving your best in a certain area, or to a certain person, or to Him, and maybe you need to say yes to God in that area.  If so, check that box and write that down.  We will pray for you in that area this week.   Galatians 6:7, 8 says this, “Don’t be misled.  No one makes a fool of God.  What a person plants, he will harvest.  The person who plants selfishness, keeping the best for myself, ignoring the needs of others, ignoring God, harvests a crop of weeds.  All he will have to show for his life is weeds.  But the one who plants in response to God, letting God’s Spirit do the growth in him, harvests a crop of real life, eternal life.”  You see, the consequences of saying no to God, when He gives you a yes moment, are devastating.  All we will have to show for our lives, are weeds. But when we say yes, and give our best to God and to others, we experience real life, and eternal life.  
So to live a life of sacrifice, strive for success, recognize everything you have is from God, say yes to God opportunities, and finally.
4.	Give extravagantly.  Write that down. Give extravagantly.  Now I realize as you are writing that down, that the word extravagant comes with some negative connotations like—being wasteful or being thoughtless.  When I think of extravagant, some of you may be thinking of wasting money on buying a Ferrari.  That would be an extravagant gift.  But what I mean here is giving in a way that is more than expected.  In a way that literally blows people away.  You see, in the Bible, Jesus teaches of the value not of just making a sacrifice, but He teaches the value of making an extravagant sacrifice, in a way that is completely unexpected.  And in a way that goes against what people, people might even say that it is absurd.  Look at what Mark 12 says, “Then Jesus went over to the collect box at the Temple and He sat and watched while the crowd dropped in their money.”  You don’t think that Jesus cares about how you give of your best to others and to Him.  He’s watching how people give.  And it says this.  “Many rich people put in large amounts.  Then a poor widow came and dropped in two pennies.  He called His disciples to Him and said, ‘I assure you.  This poor widow gave more than all the others have given.  For they have given a tiny part of their surplus, but she, as poor as she is, has given everything she has.’”  Now, I want you to know in this story, after this poor widow gives the two pennies.  Jesus doesn’t chase after her with the two pennies and say—here, here ma’am.  I realize that you don’t have much.  Take these back.  There is no  need for you to give to the poor.  Instead, Jesus says that she is an example and she is the person who gets it.  He brings His disciples over and says that’s who we should be like.  That’s the way we should give.  This is the person who gives extravagantly, more than expected.  And you see, I wonder if one of Jesus’ disciples said—alright Teacher, this is what we will do.  I have two pennies that belong to us.  I will just put the two pennies in the offering and I will take that back to her so that she will have those two pennies.  One of His disciples might have said that, but if they did, I would imagine Jesus said—no, because she is doing the right thing.  She is living as she is supposed to live.  Now, when she give those two pennies, not only is it going to help other people, not only is she giving back to God, but in return, God is going to bless her life in incredible ways because she did that.  You see, selfishness blocks love.  It blocks my love for others.  It blocks other’s love for me.  It blocks my relationship with God.  But extravagant giving knocks down walls and allows us to give and receive others from others and love with God, maybe as we never have before.  A quick example of this was, the other week, I had to get up really early in the morning to go to work.  I had some seminars to prepare for.  I just had to get up earlier than I normally get up.  I remember getting out of bed.  I was so tired and my wife, Lori, rolled over as I was getting out of bed and Lori had a day off coming up.  She had the entire day off.  She rolled over in bed and said, “Kerrick, could you do me a favor and walk the dog before you leave so I can sleep late?”  I remember thinking to myself—I can’t believe she just asked me to do this.  I’m facing an entire day of work.  I had to get up early and now I have to spend an extra 10-15 minutes to walk the dog.  Why?  So that you can sleep late on your day off.  And I remember, I mumbled that as I got ready for work.  Right before I left, I remember thinking to myself—I could just leave the dog here and tell her I ran out of time and she can walk the dog.  Finally, I had to say—come here, dog.  I was really upset.   So I go out and walk the dog.  Something strange happened as I walked the dog that morning.  The longer I walked him, the more I began feeling love for my wife, as I began thinking to myself, as I was walking the dog—you know what, Lori has had a very tough last two months.  She had a lot of things going on.  And she had a really tough week, and this is her day off and what she wanted to do was sleep late.  And by walking this dog, I’m giving her a gift.  Maybe its not an extravagant gift, but I am giving her a gift so that she can sleep late.  I remember by the time I got through walking the dog, I got the dog back inside.  I remember thinking, my love, just doing that walk for my wife, had grown to be more than it had been before I started.  Of course, her love for me, because I had just given her a gift, of being able to sleep late.  You might say—hey, that is a small example, but I know what would have happened if I had decided not to walk the dog.  I know that number one, she wouldn’t have been happy with me and her love for me would decrease, but number two, I would have been mad at her all day.  She would have been mad at me and our love for each other would have decreased.  And by giving that gift to her, our love increased.  See, if you want your love for others to grow, find a way to give to them extravagantly.  In fact, how can you give extravagantly today?  How can you give to your spouse extravagantly?  How can you give to a co-worker extravagantly?  How can you give to a friend or family member extravagantly?  In fact, I want to ask you this.  This is your homework for this week.  Find a way to give extravagantly this week, to God and to others.  To find somebody in your life, find someone who you can blow away with your generosity.  I don’t mean to spend a lot of money, but I mean giving to them in an unexpected way, in a way that goes beyond.  And when you do that, see if your love for that person and their love for you doesn’t grow.  Listen, living a life of sacrifice will never be the most popular calling in the world.  In fact, most people, including followers of Jesus are more interested in getting than in giving.  More interested in keeping the very best of life, instead of giving the very best of life.  That’s just the way the world works.  But Jesus turns the world’s standards upside down and He calls us to live lives of sacrifice, not of selfishness.  Now keep in mind—living a life of sacrifice isn’t just doing one sacrificial thing.  It’s not giving just one time, but it’s a way of living that God has chosen for us and that demonstrates for us in the life of Jesus Christ.  You see, Jesus is our ultimate example of sacrifice.  Jesus gave the ultimate sacrifice.  You see, He had every right to ignore us.  We turned our back on God.  He had every right to ignore us.  He decided to give the most extravagant gift that has ever been given.  He gave His life, He laid down His life for us, so that we could have a relationship with God so that we could experience God in our life, so that we could spend eternity in Heaven with God.  That’s the most extravagant gift that has ever been given.  That is the example that God wants us to follow.  Look at the last verse in your outline.  II Corinthians 9.  I want us to read this last verse out loud together.  Are you ready?  I was looking at the wrong verse.  Our memory verse this week from Jesus from Ephesians 5, ready?  “Live your life filled with love for others.  Following the example of Christ Who loved you and gave Himself as a sacrifice to take away your sins.”
	Let’s bow our heads and pray together.
	Father, I thank You for making the ultimate, extravagant sacrifice for us.  Even though we turned our backs on You, even though we disobeyed You, even though we walk away from You time after time, You loved us so much that You laid down Your life so that we could have a relationship with you.  God, my prayer is that there is someone here today whose has never experienced Your extravagant love, Your sacrificial love for us, and I pray today that they will take that next step and ask You to come into their life and become a follower of Yours.  Father, all of us who are here today, all of us who are listening to me today, we have a choice to make every day of our life.  We have a choice where we can be like Cain and we can say—God, I’m keeping the very best of my life to myself.  I’m not going to share with others.  I’m not going to share with You.  I am going to keep this to myself.  I am going to live a life of selfishness.  But God, we also have another choice.  We can live a life like Abel and we can take the very best that You blessed us with and bless others with it, and we can take the very best that You have given us and give You back the very best and receive a life of blessing.  My prayer, God, today, is that we will choose to be like Abel, and we will choose to live a life of sacrifice, not only will we bless others, not only will we honor You, but we will live the life that You want us to live.  I pray this in Jesus’ name.  Amen.
This sermon transcript is a free resource provided by Nelson Searcy and Church Leader Insights.  For other resources visit www.ChurchLeaderInsights.com.
	
Nelson Searcy is the founding and Lead Pastor of The Journey Church in New York City. The Journey is an innovative, multi-cultural, multi-site church in Manhattan and Jersey City.  The Journey is one of the fastest growing churches in the United States and was recognized by Outreach Magazine in 2006 as one of the Top 25 Innovated Churches in America.  The church is recognized for its creativity, media and relevant approach to life changing teaching. Nelson is also the founder of www.ChurchLeaderInsights.com - a website devoted to resourcing pastors and church leaders.