Tuesday, April 22, 2008
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Now I am not much for playing board games. That's B-O-A-R-D games, because I usually end up bored like the other spelling. But there's this one game we have played over the years - it's called "Acquire" and I like it. We don't play it often, but my wife usually wins. (Maybe that's why we don't play too often.) Now in this game there are seven hotel corporations and you win a game by having the most valuable stock at the end. Now I think I know why my wife always wins. She doesn't make the mistake of buying a few stocks in a lot of companies which a lot of us do. You don't know which ones are going to take off, so you get a little in each one. She is very good at anticipating which company is going to grow, so she invests heavily in that company. She ends up with the majority in it. She gets this big bonus at the end of the game. Meanwhile I'm sitting there with lots of stock, but it's in several different companies and it just isn't worth as much as a lot of stock in a few companies.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft, and I want to have a Word With You today about "A Lot of Stock in a Few Investments."
Our word for today from the Word of God comes from Philippians chapter 1 beginning in verse 4, and Paul says, "In all my prayers for you I always pray with joy because of your partnership in the Gospel from the first day until now." Imagine being partners with the spread of the Gospel through a dynamo like the Apostle Paul. At the end of his letter in chapter 4 and beginning at verse 13, he writes about their support. He says, "I can do everything through Him who gives me strength, yet it was good of you to share in my troubles. Moreover, as you Philippians know, in the early days of your acquaintance with the gospel, when I set out from Macedonia, not one church shared with me in the matter of giving and receiving, expect you only: for even when I was in Thessalonica, you sent me aid again and again when I was in need. Not that I am looking for a gift, but I am looking for what may be credited to your account."
Now these people found a piece of God's work, the Apostle Paul, and they invested heavily in it and they received great dividends. All of his fruit, all the people Paul reached; all that was credited to their account. You see, you and I live in a world that hits us with more causes than you could ever support. Think of that stack of mail you get from Christian organizations. Now, there's a pattern. You don't see how many things you could possibly support. It's a better idea to get a lot of stock in a few eternal investments. I remember when my wife's grandmother went home to be with the Lord. Her Grandma had all these records that we went through and we found her list of "Giving and Praying" it was called, to organizations she really believed in. It started out in small script. That list probably went back to the 1940s and then the print got larger as her eyes began to fail, and at the age of 99 she was still praying for and giving to those ministries. God laid that on her heart and here was 50 years of praying and 50 years of cancelled checks to match. She was a partner in the Gospel.
Now in our self-focused generation, we have lost that excitement of sharing stock in Eternity, Inc. My friend, Jeff, is a baby boomer and he says, "I have decided I am drawing a line in my checkbook and that's all we really need to live on and from thereon I'm putting it into the work of God." Would you ask the Lord for a piece of his broken heart for this world, for a particular need, for some group, for some area of the world? I encourage you to ask God for a few spiritual works or people who you could really believe in, and pray for them and stick with those and give to them. The way to have a winning part in God's work on earth is to have a lot of stock in a few eternal investments, and what will happen is you'll be reaping those dividends forever.