Embracing Generosity: Living Out Our Unique Stories

every story matters immensely more than you can imagine that's one of the great lies of the evil one is your story your day your choices what you do with your time doesn't really matter all that much oh yeah it does but nobody gets the story they want and uh part of why we're here on Earth is to help each other um bear that burden to help each other live with that reality [00:01:08]

be joyful in Hope be patient in Affliction be faithful in prayer and then share with the Lord's people who are in need and I suppose every parent tries to work with their kids on sharing because you see with kids how much that's something we need to be trained in but on autopilot I don't tend to run that way [00:01:37]

years ago John and I were on staff at a very large church that had lots of vibrant Ministries um but one of them was my personal favorite because it intersected with our lives very dearly we lived in a little culdesac just a couple of miles from the church and had Neighbors on both sides one of whom was an couple maybe 10 years older than us they were both School teachers childless by choice they were very dedicated to their junior high teaching [00:02:22]

one spring day I was out in the front yard and he came over quite rapidly and he said hey when when are your church services this weekend I thought what what is going on and I told them and they were very excited to join us because at their school because they were so committed to being great teachers they worked with a teacher's aid and they loved this teacher's aid she was almost like part of their family she was a single mom with three kids [00:03:45]

this chur church that I don't even go to found out my story and gave me a van a car for my kids so that I could drive them around and H they gave me a car and as our neighbors listened to the story they looked at each other and said I think that's the church that our neighbors keep inviting us to and it was because we had in our church something called a cars Ministry [00:04:31]

it started 10 years before we got there when a guy came to the church church for 18 months his life had fallen apart his wife had left him with their kids he had lost his job he was addicted to alcohol and drugs and he came to church because he was at the end of his rope which is where Dallas says is God's address and he started coming to church and after 18 months he put his faith in Jesus [00:04:53]

I just found Christ in this church I'm so full I want to give back he's changed my life and I can't preach I can't sing I'm a mechanic and he said to our senior pastor I notice in the parking lot that there are a lot of people that go to your church that are rich people because they drive really nice cars but there's also a lot of poor people and I noticed because of the kind of cars they drive [00:05:27]

tell the rich people that when they are ready to get a new car they don't need the resale value donate the car to the church I'll take it to auction I'll get three other cars fix them up I'll get other people like me that are good at this and we'll start giving these cars away to single moms our small group Services found out about it a bunch of the small group said we throw in gift certificates for gas cards and car washes and fast food places [00:06:08]

when we left um the cars Ministry had given away over 200 cars to single moms that intersected our neighbors who weren't responding to our invitation as pastors to come to church but when somebody that they loved got a car they started coming they became Christ followers I remember the first time I was up on the platform and they were ushers in the offering plates mhm and you just never know how a story like that [00:06:38]

so much of that is do I live with a mindset of scarcity man I don't think there's going to be enough uh I told I was talking with my friend Mike last week and he was just saying he's involved in uh really really good stuff with his life but it's like uh he's just not living in financial anxiety and he's not like a wealthy guy but it's just this real clear sense of God has given me so much [00:07:20]

when people look back on their life their biggest regret was selfishness wow it's I didn't share I could have but then I asked them how often do people come to you for problem with their selfishness zero wow so the number one regret yeah is the least uh issue that people ask we're all looking for help yeah wow um so uh today is a day yeah um it's just a real simple Direction share [00:09:04]

just reflect a little bit today and God you have given me so much here I am and here I am with you and in doing that isn't that how the church lives out the gospel so that people can see they're no they'll know we are Christians by their love yep yep God so loved the world he gave yeah so let the story be a giving story [00:09:49]