What should motivate us to support the outreach ministries of this Chapel? We have budgeted $226,350 to support 24 ministries this year. Why are we giving to participate in the ministries of the Barnabas Center, Boys Service Brigade, City Rescue Mission, Eagle Ranch, East/West Ministries, Empowered Parents, Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, Greater Nassau Women's Services, Haggai Institute, Joy to the Children, Kairos Prison Ministry, MAP International, Nassau Habitat for Humnaity, Prison Fellowship Ministry, Safe Harbor, Salvation Army/Hope House, Samaritan's Purse, Seamark Ranch, Teen Community Bible Study, United Christian Academy, Wears Valley Ranch, Wycliff Bible Translators, World Vision, and the YMCA?

St. Paul said that giving to those in need is motivated by the grace of God. In 2 Corinthians 8 he held up the Macedonian churches as an example of giving. These were churches in Philippi, Thessalonica and Berea who were experiencing severe trials, and extreme poverty. Philippi was the leading city of Macedonia, a Roman colony, named after King Philip of Macedon, the father of Alexander the Great. It was the first city in Europe to hear the Gospel from Paul, who had responded to a vision of a man from Macedonia standing and begging him, "Come over to Macedonia and help us." (Acts 16:9) The church started in the home of Lydia, a dealer in purple cloth from Thyatira. The Lord opened her heart to respond to Paul's message, and the Christians met at her house. It was there that Paul and Silas were unlawfully put in prison for delivering a slave-girl from fortune-telling, and after an earthquake, witnessed to the jailer and baptized him and his household.

In Thessalonica (modern day Salonika), after beginning a church, they were accused of treason ("They are all defying Caesar's decrees, saying that there is another king, one called Jesus.") They had to leave town. In Berea they found the locals more noble in character and avid students of the Scriptures, but their enemies from Thessalonica followed them, agitated and stirred up the crowds so that Paul had to leave town again.

Despite their economic and social challenges the members of these churches were overflowing with joy. Paul wrote the Philippians a letter, which is often call the Epistle of Joy. He urges them to "Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice." (Philippians 4:4) He mentions that they sent him aid again and again when he was in need. He promised them that God would meet all their needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus. (Phil.4:16,19) Paul also wrote two letters to the Thessalonians. He notes that "in spite of severe suffering, you welcomed the message with the joy given by the Holy Spirit. And so you became a model to all believers in Macedonia and Achaia." (1 Thess. 1:6,7)

They gave to others in need because they were experiencing being filled to overflowing with the joy of the Lord. This joy did not come from the fact that God had prospered them financially. Their joy came from an experience of God's grace: God's unmerited and undeserved favor given them in the person and work of Christ, who made peace for them on the Cross, gave them the assurance of eternal life, the sure and certain hope of the resurrection, the presence and power of the Spirit, and the love of fellow believers. Despite their poverty and troubles they had exchanged lostness and futility for meaning and purpose. They enjoyed a sense of the sacred value of their lives. The world became an enchanted place of beauty, reflecting the glory of God, rather than a fearful and perilous place. Life became significant for them and gave them promise for the future. God had done so much for them that they wanted to give thanks through wanting to do something for others. Christ had delivered them from the darkness and oppression of idol worship, occult practices, the cheapness and despair of life, and coarseness and violence in family and civic life. They experienced, in Christ, life in all its fullness; wholeness of life, a productive life full of light and love.

"For the productive character giving has an entirely different meaning. Giving is the highest expression of potency. In the very act of giving I experience my strength, my wealth, my power. The experience of heightened vitality fills me with joy. I experience myself as overflowing, spending, alive, hence as joyous. Giving is more joyous than receiving, not because it is a deprivation, but because in the act of giving lies the expression of my aliveness." (Erich Fromm, The Art of Loving, 18,19)

Their overflowing joy welled up in rich generosity. They gave as much as they were able, and even beyond their ability. Their giving wasn't token, it was in proportion to what they had. They even went beyond what they had. They gave out of their substance, not out of their excess. They gave, not leftovers, but from the main course of their consumption. They gave not reluctantly, nor parsimoniously, but enthusiastically. They did not have to be cajoled, or exhorted, or shamed, into giving. "Entirely on their own, they urgently pleaded with us for the privilege of sharing in this service to the saints." (2 Cor.8:4) They saw being able to give to the needy as a privilege not an imposition. They saw their giving as a sharing with others in a service, a way of helping those in need. Why did they respond like this?

Because they gave themselves first to the Lord and to the apostles according to God's will and purpose. They were so thankful for all that the Lord had done for them that they offered him their lives, all that they had, in service. God's gift of salvation resulted in a desire to follow Christ. Paul held up this earnest example of the Macedonians to the Corinthians to challenge them to show the sincerity of their love.

Jesus himself is the example of how grace joyfully expresses itself in love. He was rich in heavenly splendor and yet in his grace he became poor by being born into the human family, into the humble circumstances of this world, so that through this obedience even to the death on the cross, we might become rich through his salvation, and join him in his heavenly kingdom.

Paul ends 2 Thessalonians with this greeting and benediction: "The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all." How can you experience this grace in your own life? C.S. Lewis entitled his spiritual autobiography, "Surprised by Joy". When you open yourself to Christ, the Spirit of joy will enter in, and you will experience this grace, this spiritual enrichment as you trust in him. To open yourself in this way you have to be willing to receive what he has for you, to surrender to his loving infilling, to let go your need to be in control and to be self-sufficient. This willingness is a risk. It is called 'faith.'

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