Ep #01: Welcome to the Second Half Stewardship Podcast!

Episode Transcript

Spencer: Well, we're excited to welcome you to our first episode of the Second Half Stewardship Podcast. I'm Spencer again, this is Austin, and we're excited to dove in again. Our thesis is that God owns it all, and so as we unpack this overview, we want to reflect a little bit on that and then dove into some scriptural passages again, that'll give some color to what where we'll be headed over the next few weeks and really the trajectory of our podcast over a long period of time.

Austin: Yeah. So, you know, one of the things that when we think about God owns it all. There's a quote by Abraham Kuyper that Spencer and I have come back to several times, and it says, “There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is sovereign over all, does not cry, 'Mine.'"

And you know as I think about that quote. It kind of encapsulates this idea that we want to come back to you over and over that God owns at all that he is sovereign over all. And it's not just my time. It's not just my money. It's not just my relationships. He really is sovereign over everything, not just of me, but of the entirety of the human existence. And that's really a profound thought as we start off today.

Spencer: Absolutely. There's so many different ways that that impacts our lives. And if we just start with that at the beginning of each day and then we move through our day with that awareness, I just think about how much that changes things. You know, just one thing that comes to mind is even going and visiting a monastery. And you see these monks come back six and seven times a day to pray and they know that regardless what happens in those few hours in between, they're going to come back and they're going to recognize I'm still the Lord's and that's my identity.

So, as we reflect on that course, we're not going to be monks in a monastery day to day, but we do want to come back to that and have that invade kind of each moment of the day as much as possible, and to be able to have conversations about how we see that playing out in our lives. One of the guiding principles, of course, as we think about the podcast, is that we want to love God and love others.

And so as we lay down some of these kind of guiding principles, you know, we go back to Mark 12:28-31, which says “And one of the scribes came up and heard them disputing with one another and seeing that he answered them well, asked him which commandment is the most important of all, and Jesus answered, the most important is hear O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one, and you shall love the Lord Your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. The second is this You shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is no other commandment greater than these.”

So as we come back to that, we really want to have the knowledge of the Bible moved from our head to our hearts, out through our hands, as we love God in a deeper way, but also love others. And so, we hope that as you take this and either via the podcast or on YouTube, that that will be an encouragement to you.

Austin: Yeah. And, you know, Spencer and I have talked several times, we love our families. There's a lot of funny stories about our kids that we could tell. But the reality is what happens on the Internet stays on the Internet. And to love God and to love our neighbors, we want to speak honorably of the people that we share about.

So, we're going to try to be candid with some stories. We might share some funny stories, but we're not going to disclose who they're about. We're not going to talk about their names because we do believe we want to honor these people. We haven't necessarily talked to our kids about whether they want to be on a podcast. We might have some fun later with that.

But really, as we are, you know, as we think about honoring people, we want to we want to, yeah, we just want to honor them. We don't want to tear them down. We want to tear ourselves down. So, we also want to share candidly and with humility. So, we hope to share with y'all where we've both failed in a lot of these areas of believing that God owns it all and acting that out.

But we also want to share times that we've seen success. We're not always going to fail in these areas. I may fail more often than not, but. But we do want to say that God has done a work in our lives, and we can celebrate that. And so, we want to do that with humility, too.

Spencer: And just also to give you a sense of rest about the fact that we're engaged in this podcast and we don't have any capacity related come stand-up comedians or anything like that. We, we will share some dad jokes from time to time. So, we'll try to make those related to money. So, the first one that we have is, Austin what did the football coach say to the broken vending machine?

Austin: Oh, gosh, I don't know, Spencer, what did he say.

Spencer: Give me my quarterback. So, you know, we do want to have some fun as well, you know, as we move through this and be able to just unpack thoughts and and also reflect on some humorous moments that we see going on in the culture. Because there are plenty of those, both with respect to money and then culture, generally speaking.

Austin: So, diving into our main topic for today, it is God owns it all. So we're going to come back to this thesis over and over and over and really, you know, as I think about this topic, we both have gone through the Certified Kingdom Advisors Educational Program. And so we take a lot of the topics that we're going to talk about God owns it all.

How much is enough? Who's the next steward? Are they prepared? A lot of those questions are going to really drive our conversations. And so, we want to say thanks to the Certified Kingdom Advisors program for that foundation that they've laid for us. And we realize as well, Ecclesiastes says there's nothing new under the sun. They took what they learned from Scripture and from wise people before them.

So, we just want to say thank you to those that have gone before us. But yeah, we want to come back over and over to Scripture. What does that say as we think about God owns it all? But before we go into that, we're going to look over just we're going to come back to the Kuyper quote. There was an article that I read about it by Roger Henderson called Kuyper’s Inch.

And again, he says in this article, this idea that God owns it all, he's sovereign over the entirety of human existence. Roger says, “this requires of us that we look for the ways everyday humans, human affairs are connected with the Lord Almighty. That is not as foreign affairs, but is involving belonging to Christ. Living like this involves believing in Christ and trusting in Him as sovereign Lord of civic, legal, economic, domestic, artistic and entertainment as well as church and mission affairs.”

It really encapsulates everything. God owns it all encapsulates everything. So, Spencer, where are some ways that we see culture moving awry and astray from this idea that God owns at all.

Spencer: Well, and you know, we've talked about this, you know, for months and months, Austin, as we prepare for this, even just hearing you say that quote, what struck me is you know, if he owns it all, then we can release our hands. You know, in some ways, we don't have to fear as we think about our civic engagement.
We don't have to fear as we think about what might happen with the economy. We don't have to fear about, you know, our relationships. But we can trust that we have a loving father who is for us in the midst of those. And that's that's something that, again, we'll get into further. But I think back to your question, you know, when we look at where culture is and where is, does it go in a different direction?

You know, then seeing God as the owner of all, you know, I love I quote that we saw there from Slaughterhouse-Five that says, “Like so many Americans, she was trying to construct a life that made sense from the things she found in gift shops.” You know, if we if we're not rooted in this idea that God owns it all, then where do we go?

You know, where do we place our meaning? You know, is it some sense of general success or is it some sense of, you know, some number that we're trying to achieve in our net worth? Is it some layer of relationship influence that people like us, we just have no moorings there. So it's disorienting, really, if we don't have that as our is our fixed point.

Austin: Yeah. And Dave Ramsey said at one point, we buy things we don't need with money. We don't have to impress people that we don't like.

Spencer: Yeah. You know, I might even add that we sit in classes, we find dull in order to get jobs that we dislike so that we can buy things we don't need with money that we don't have to impress, people that we don't like. You know, we can even go farther upstream than Ramsey does because if we don't have a sense of really God's owning our lives and everything about it, then, you know, the educational choices that we make, the career paths, all of those things that are even before a purchasing decision, then we're disoriented there as well.

But if we have that, where we're seeing ourselves as stewards of all that, God's given us our intellectual capabilities, our gifts, our experiences, our relationships. Well, now we can have a peace. A peace, and a rest. Because we know where we really need to be mentally, at least on our good days.

Austin: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And so, you know, as we move from where culture is and we're going to wrestle with this a lot, this idea of where does culture say we need to spend our money, where does culture say we need to spend our time? We want to come back to the bedrock of scripture, because if we don't continue to submit to Scripture to obey Scripture, then we're going to continue to get pulled and pulled and pulled into whatever waters that we're swimming in.

So today we're going to look at 1Chronicles 29 specifically verses 1-22, but kind of the entirety of the context we're looking at. It's going to be 1 Chronicles 28-29. And so just some background of this is 1 Chronicles 28, David's at the end of his life. He has longed to build a house for the Ark of the Covenant.
God, however, in David's wrestling, has told him that because he's been a man of war, because he's shed so much blood, he can't build the temple. And so David acknowledges that Solomon is the king, that God has chosen to succeed. So we think about it. We're like, okay, David's looking forward. He's looking to the next steward who's going to come after him.

He encourages Solomon to trust the Lord that God will never leave him, nor forsake him, and to pursue building the temple. And then we come into 1 Chronicles 29. In the first nine verses, David is recognizing he can't build the temple. Then he gives of his own wealth to build the temple. He knows he can't do it. God does not let him do it, but he's like, I'm going to give so that it can be done. And then in an astounding turn, he invites the people of God. He invites the people of Israel to give as well, and they give abundantly of what God has given them. So, it's this realization by David as the King, I can't do this, but what I can do is I can help the next person do it.

He recognizes that what God has given him, He can give back to the Lord freely, with open hands. And this causes the people to rejoice and it says because they had freely given willingly or because they had given willingly for the whole heart, they had offered freely to the Lord. David, the King also greatly rejoiced. So let me go ahead.

I'm going to read off the main passage. So this is going to be 1 Chronicles 29:10-13, then I'm going to pass it back to you, Spencer. So, it says “Therefore, David, blessed the Lord in the presence of all the assembly. And David said, Blessed are you, O Lord, the God of Israel, our Father, forever and ever yours, O Lord, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the victory in the Majesty for all that is in heaven, is in the heavens, and in the earth is yours. Yours is the kingdom, O Lord, and you are exalted as head above all, both riches and honor come from your hand, and you rule over all. In your hand are power and might and in your hand it is to make great and to give strength to all. And now we thank you, our God, and praise your glorious name."

Spencer: And what a powerful passage. I mean, we see the encapsulation there, but if we go back again to that key phrase for all that is in the heavens and the earth is yours, yours is the kingdom O Lord, and you are exalted as head above all. God is the Creator, He's the owner, but he's also the one that receives glory from that level of ownership.

He is the one that we need to acknowledge. And so often, even if we have a level of mental assent, we believe it intellectually. Seeing that come down into our hearts and then into our actions is much more challenging because oftentimes we want to we might be drawn to a place where we want to see ourselves have the acclaim or the honor. And yet God is not just the owner. He is the one that should be praised, you know, as the owner.

Austin: Yeah. Yeah. And you know, as I think about this is God owns it all. And just like you were saying, He deserves it all. It is his in the first place. And it's only our responsibility and reflection on his, his ownership of it all that we can freely give. You know, as I think about things that that the Ron Blue Institute has talked about, it's when I start giving my money away, it releases the power that money has on my life.

And so I need to be a steward by releasing that power because it is God's in the first place. And if I don't release it back to him, then I'm trying to hoard and hold, which is often the message of the culture is what's mine is mine. Hold on to it. Keep tight, or else you're not going to have enough.

And I need to continue to believe God has given us beauty and abundance and good things, whether it's hundreds of dollars or whether it's millions of dollars like it is still all the Lord's. And it's still my duty and my responsibility as a faithful follower of Jesus to release that back to Him because he does own it all.
It is his in the first place. And if I do that, then I can respond like David does in rejoicing and celebration. I can respond like the people of Israel because they had given willingly for with a whole heart they had offered freely to the Lord, that freedom is really powerful. When we say, I'm not the owner, I'm simply a steward, and I get to see God in that light.

Spencer: Absolutely. You know, as we think about what we see in the Old Testament, of course, it's reflected. We saw that in the New Testament in one passage already. But we look at it in a second passage, you know, from the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 6. And of course, this is Jesus teaching from Matthew five through seven, and there's so much incredible wisdom here. We'll just highlight one small passage. But of course, Matthew 6:19-20 says, "Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal But lay up for yourselves Treasures in heaven where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal.”

It's that sense that the wealth that we have in this world is perishable, but there are true riches. You know what Randy Alcorn comes back to time and time again saying, “You can't take it with you, but you can send it on ahead.” We cannot take the riches of this life and even begin to think that because we have a strong, you know, bank account or our net worth is significant, that that's going to mean anything in the next life. So, you know, again, Jesus is saying don't lay up for ourselves treasures on earth because it becomes an impediment. It becomes a tripping agent, you know, for us.

Austin: And Jesus finishes that by saying where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. And so is it going to be treasures on earth or is it going to be treasures in heaven? Is it going to be God in his beauty or is it going to be the stuff that we can't take with us? You know, it's that constant tension.
And again, we release it back. God owns it. Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. So let's lay out for ourselves treasures in heaven, let's not lay out for ourselves treasures on earth. So last we're going to take a look at 1 Corinthians 4:2, and it just says, “Moreover, it is required of stewards that one be found faithful.”

And, you know, as I think about this, this is the heart of who we are. We want to be faithful stewards. We want to be found faithful by the Lord. We want to be ones that continue to lay ourselves down at the feet of Jesus and say, I don't know what's best. I really don't. I very rarely know what's good for myself. But if I spend time in silence, if I spend time in prayer and in seeking Jesus and praying and saying God, I don't know what’s wise. Help me be a generous steward then, man the Lord honors that. I think the Lord honors our humility.

Spencer: Yeah, for sure. Because we really have to put ourselves in a posture where we're listening and that tends to help us listen to the Lord, but also listen to other people. Because, you know, we look at biblical wisdom. We try to listen to the Holy Spirit, we also try to listen to wise mentors. And that puts us in a much better posture than if we approach things, saying, Well, I own this, and so I've got, you know, all that I need. I'm just going to go on my merry way and make my own decisions. Such a different energy. You know, there, you know, we're talking about asking the Lord, I mean, we'll come back to this. But James 1:5 you know that James tells you know those that they need to be asking God who gives generously to all without finding fault when they need wisdom.

So what a great practice. You know, one of the things that we want to do as we walk through each of these episodes certainly come back to the word and receive encouragement, inspiration, correction, you know, from it. But we also want to be able to share some examples from our own lives of where we find ourselves falling short or where it's difficult, where we feel that rub from culture and then things that maybe we found from others or in our own lives that have been helpful.
But, you know, as I think about this, I find again, coming back to that idea of mental assent that I can say God owns it all. I can say that three times a day. And yet the creep of the culture, the creep of, you know, other messages comes in and I'll find myself not having a level of freedom.

I think about, you know, this in particular with respect to, you know, buying my father's financial planning firm and paying down that debt. Now I can no that over time as I pay down that debt that the Lord's in charge of that every step of the way. I don't really own the business. The Lord owns the business and yet for some reason I find that as I pay that down more and more, it gives me, you know, this level of peace about things.

But instead of having a peace that allows me to maybe say, well, I can I'll be able to give more, you know, back to the Lord or give more to charitable institutions or something. I find that as we get closer to paying that firm off, that I'm closer to feeling the draw of consumerism because, you know, now there'll be, you know, resources that I could do different things with.

Well, that should not have any bearing, you know, on things I should say. Okay, well, with those resources now I have a greater capacity, again, as a different part of stewardship, that instead of paying off the debt, which is an important thing now, I get to be able to invest in some, some other areas. I'm still a steward both ways, but for me I find that drift, that pull towards consumerism and towards this message of, well, you know, wouldn't it be fun to be able to do this or have this experience or buy this product that would solve, you know, issues for me?

Austin: Yeah. You know, I think for me when I think about God owns it all and it comes down in my heart to a level of control man do I love to be in control. I love controlling my kids behavior, it doesn't work, but I like to try. My spending habits. I find a joy in controlling what I spend because I if I hold it back for myself and I'm like, I've done good. I haven't bought what I should have bought. And it's just that level of like, okay, I need to I need to find security and I find security in control. And, you know, when I buy big purchases, when I make big decisions like that or what I perceive to be big decisions, I will spend months researching sometimes longer than that.

It really comes down to I'm trying to find every little detail about every little thing. And if I truly believe what Jesus says in Matthew 6 that I'm just laying out treasures for myself, I can still do that research. It's not a bad thing to want to buy things. We have to I have to buy clothes. I have to buy food, I have to buy vehicles. I have to get to work. Like buying things is not the problem. It's the control that I feel that I have to do all of my due diligence and I spend time and labor and just countless hours thinking about it, pining before I make the decision, weighing the pros and cons or otherwise, I'm going to feel regret. It's that that need to control that gets into my head and then I forget that God owns it. And it yeah, it's a decision. It's a big decision, but it's not the decision. And I need to lay that back before the Lord.

Spencer: Yeah. So important. So you know as we journey with you on this, what we hope to do as well is to provide gentle encouragement of some different things that you might consider doing that could help you in your journey. We're doing these things as well. And so as we think about the first few weeks here, we'd encourage you to memorize Ephesians 2:4-6, because when we think about money, it can be a subject that can shut us down emotionally.

We can feel a lot of shame, a lot of guilt. We can say, well, I've made poor decisions. It can really be devastating because the enemy can come in and he can tell all kinds of different lies. He can also remind us of things that we have done wrong, you know. So we want to come back to that sense.

You know, I think the two most important words maybe in the entire Bible, but God, you know, the direction that we go is so often contrary to him, but he intervenes. And so, you know, our encouragement would be even as we get into this topic of money and thinking about stewardship and the fact that God does own it all, starting with a sense of his grace, of his pursuit of us.

So Ephesians 2:4-6. “But God being rich in mercy because of the great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ. By grace you have been saved, and raised us up with Him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.” So again, coming back to that sense of His love, and if we can remember that each day as we think about things that maybe he could do in our lives to be better stewards than we're coming at it from the right angle, rather than a taskmaster who just cares about us getting it right.

Austin: Yeah, absolutely. You know, memorizing that is fantastic. It will change and shape the way that we see God, which will then help change and shape the way that we see ourselves. Because if we see ourselves as loved, then we can move into the day reminded that we are loved by the Lord. Another thing that we would challenge you guys to think about and to do daily is this pray the Lord's Prayer.

You know, it's simple, but it reframes who we are. It reframes what we are about. It reminds us that God is the King. It reminds us that he is our provider. So just taking some time before you get out of bed, pray the Lord's Prayer. Before you fall asleep, pray the Lord's Prayer. Pray with your kids the Lord's Prayer, if you have kids. You know, just it's a good it's such a simple thing, but it is such a good reframing reminder.

Spencer: Absolutely. And you know, we follow in good company whether any strand of Christianity, you know, you see folks that started and ended their day with the Lord's Prayer. Luther always said that he didn't let his feet hit the floor until he had prayed the Lord's Prayer. And, you know, so many things that go before us, it was the same kind of thing. And then ending the days with the Lord's Prayer as well.

The last thing that we would encourage you, if you want to take a step again in the direction to kind of think about your role as a steward of God's resources is to compile a balance sheet, to compile just a statement of what you have resource wise. And of course, we're going to get into much more than just the financial resources or the possessions that you have, but also be talking about time and relationships and experiences and gifting in these different pieces.

But, you know, one first step that you could take if you haven't done so, you don't have that handy, is what are the assets that the Lord has entrusted you with from a financial standpoint, from a possessions standpoint? Because then if you at least have that, then you can begin to lay that before the Lord and say, okay, Lord, how will you use this? But until we have a little bit more clarity there, sometimes that gets in the way.

Austin: Absolutely. So we're going to close out just with a couple quotes or a quote, and then we're going to kind of forecast where we're headed and yeah, so Jim Elliott says “he is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain, what he cannot lose.” That’s just profound.

Spencer: A powerful life story. If you haven't heard of Jim and Elizabeth Elliott, Jim was killed in going as a missionary to people who had never heard the Gospel of the Lord. And by God's grace, you know, his life was used so that an entire group of people were able to hear and many came to faith. But, you know, he was also an amazing wordsmith and author.

And so much of the wisdom of his life, you know, was captured in that way. But again, he is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose. The material possessions that we have as stewards. The Lord expects us to use them for those things that can't be lost.

Austin: Yeah, absolutely. So over the next couple of weeks, we're going to be looking more deeply into this idea that God owns at all. He owns our money, he owns our time, our relationships, our gifts, and our experiences. So the next couple of podcast, that's what we're going to be doing. We're going to be diving into God owns money, God owns time, God owns relationships, and we're going to dive a little bit more deeply into each of those topics.

So just before we close out, if you guys have found value in this share with a friend, just one friend, say, hey, I think that this is something that you you might enjoy. We think that these ideas and these topics are really fleshed out well with other people. So if you find it valuable, share it with somebody and then talk it over with them. Thank you guys so much for listening in and we hope to see you again soon.

Spencer: Until next time. Take care.