TGCN 2025: Giving as a Means of Sanctification

So the theme of the conference is of course the gospel for everyday life which is very broad and we want to explore different implications of the gospel for our everyday life. Now I will have a very narrow implication that I will focus on. I will focus on how generosity, how our giving not only meets important needs but primarily is a means God uses to shape us into the likeness of his son Jesus Christ. Now I very seldom teach in English so I will be very bound by my manuscript. We very often speak about means of grace such as Bible reading and meditating on the word and prayer and fellowship with the saints and fasting and so on. Yet we far less often speak about giving as a powerful means through which God works holiness in our lives. Now I believe with all my heart that God uses our giving as a means to accomplish his eternal plan for us that we might be conformed to the image of his son as he says in Romans 8:29.
In other words, giving is a means in our process of sanctification. Now, as Scott mentioned, sanctification usually in scripture refers to positional sanctification. That is the status we receive when we are united to Christ. When we are set apart as the people of God for his purposes. And just like our regeneration or new birth or our justification, our adoption, this is an immediate work. I want to focus on what we could call our progressive sanctification which is not so much about our new status before God as holy but about God’s transforming work in us whereby he gradually and through various means makes us holy shapes our souls uh into the likeness of Christ. We can illustrate the relationship between positional sanctification and progressive sanctification by thinking of a sharp piece of glass. If you throw a sharp piece of glass into the water, the second it touches the water, it becomes wet. That is the first thing the water does to that sharp piece of glass. But the longer that that piece of glass lies in the water and is tossed around by the waves against the rocks, it will be reshaped by the water and the waves. And that’s also how it is with our sanctification. The moment we are touched by Christ, the moment we are united with Christ, we become saints. But the longer we walk with him, of course, and the spirit of God works in our lives through the various circumstances of life, we will be shaped and formed into his likeness. Sanctification is God’s continuing work of what he began in our regeneration, in our new birth when he gave us a new heart, a new mind, a new will, new desires, new affections. And it will be complete in the work of glorification on that great day when Jesus returns and by his sight we are transformed fully into his likeness. First John 3 says we know that when he appears we shall be like him because we shall see him as he is and everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure. So if you hope in Christ and the transformation he’ll one day bring, you will purify yourself in anticipation of that day. And of course, just like the rest of our salvation process, this is God’s work, but it is a work in which we are active. It calls for our active effort as we apply in our lives the means of grace that God in his goodness and wisdom has given us. So we’re not talking today about giving in general. We are talking specifically about the spiritual fruits of generosity in us. Now I I think all of us can agree that giving is something Christ calls all his believers to. Now I will not spend time
talking about how much we should give or what principles should guide our giving on to what we should give that has been taught elsewhere. Uh I want to focus on what giving brings in our own souls. We give for a bunch of external reasons. We give because we need to pay the salary of our pastor or because of the rent of the church building or for missionaries and church planters and mercy ministries and so on. Finally, we give because the word of God commands us to give. But I believe the most important reason to give consistently is our own spiritual health and growth. So when we use the means of grace that God has given us, we are investing in our own souls, we are sowing to the spirit
as Galatians says. And the return on this investment is growth in Christ likeness. So, I want to encourage you to view your giving, your family’s generosity, not only as an investment in God’s purposes in the world, but also and primarily in his purposes in you and your soul. And these two go of course hand in hand. Andrew Davis writes in his book, An infinite Journey. God has set before the church of Jesus Christ two infinite journeys. These two journeys have one destination, one ultimate goal and in the end will prove to have been one and the same journey after all. Before the foundation of the world, God ordained these two journeys for his glory and for the joy of his people. And
what are these journeys? First, the external journey of the worldwide advance of the kingdom of Jesus Christ to all nations. and Two, the internal journey of an individual Christian from being dead in sin to gloriously perfect in Christ. The essential idea of a journey is a progress that is advancing gradually to a desired destination. And he goes on to say that both these journeys require great effort, labor and suffering. Now far often when we give, we are rightly motivated by the external results of our giving. Far too often we focus almost exclusively on the external results of our giving and we overlook or fail to consider at all what giving does to our own souls. Now this applies both to our regular giving to our local church but also to our generosity more broadly and I want to highlight during this session three sacred outcomes of biblical giving in the Christian’s soul. So what fruits does God produce in us when we in the name of Christ let go of our riches? First giving brings us true joy.
In Acts 20:35, speaking to the elders in Ephesus, Paul quotes Jesus saying, “In all things I have shown you that by working hard in this way, we must help the weak and remember the words of the Lord Jesus how he himself said it is more blessed to give than to receive.” Now blessedness means joy but not that temporary fleeting joy that depends on the circumstances of our lives but the deep fixed joy that is grounded in the very person of God himself. In fact Paul calls God himself blessed two times in the first epistle to Timothy. Amen.
Two times in 1 Timothy 1:11 he speaks of the gospel of the glory of the blessed God and later in chapter 6 verse 15 he calls God the blessed and only sovereign blessedness is a divine attribute which means that God our God is a joyful rich satisfied and content God who does and has everything he desires. That means God was not wrathful in eternity past. And Christ was not the man of sorrows before the incarnation. The Puritan Luis Batty said, “Blessedness is that perfect and unmeasurable possession of joy and glory which God hath in himself forever and is the cause of all the bliss and
perfection that every creature enjoys in its measure.” And and the modern theologian, the Presbyterian theologian Terry Johnson adds, “Away them then with the image of the sad old man in heaven, perpetually grumpy, constantly frustrated, eternally displeased, banish the thoughts of a heavenly kill joy, miserable in himself, and determined to inflict misery on others. The God of heaven and earth is a happy God.”
The pre-incarnate Christ speaks as God’s wisdom in Proverbs 8 and he says, “Ages ago I was set up at the first before the beginning of the earth. Then I was beside him that is the father like a master worksman and I was daily his delight rejoicing before him always.” And the father says to his son, “As we know, you are my beloved son. with you I am well pleased. So the triune God is in himself an eternal boundless overflowing fellowship of pure joy and the salvation of the sinner is the exchange of all the sorrows of the fall for union with the source of all joy the blessed God himself. Now if sanctification is about becoming like Christ, God’s exact imprint and God is eternally blessed and blessedness means joy then our process of sanctification must include our growth in holy joy in
blessedness. And Jesus himself said, “It is more blessed to give than to receive.” My wife Sophia here loves presents. And in God’s good and wise providence, she has been blessed with a husband who is utterly unskilled at finding good presents. Yet my experience which I think most of us can relate to is that the joy I receive in giving a gift to my wife or to to whoever and seeing their reaction or their gladness in using that gift brings me a far deeper joy than receiving a gift myself. No matter how much I was desiring that gift, my gratitude, my peaceful, warm joy is greater when I give than when I receive. And this is not because I am so very virtuous as a person. It is because God has created us in that way. And in the new birth, he has remade us to function in that way. For the blessed God in whose image we are made is himself a giving God. Listen to these verses.
Matthew 7:11. If you then who are evil know how to give good gifts to your
children, how much more will your father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him. Matthew 5:45. So that you may be sons of your father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good. And he sends rain on the just and on the unjust.
James 1:17, “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above.”
Acts 14:17, Paul is preaching and he says, “Yet he did not leave himself God without witness. For he did good by giving you rains from heaven and fruitful seasons, satisfying your hearts with food and gladness.”
Friends, these gifts from above not only testify of God’s existence but also of his character. They proclaim, “I am a generous God.” And it’s safe to say that our desire to give and our joy in giving is rooted in the fact that we are made and remade in the image of a good giver. And of course, the ultimate expression of divine generosity is Calvary Hill where the God the Father gave his most precious son. And the son willingly poured himself out for us. For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ that though he was rich yet for your sake he became poor so that you by his poverty
might become rich. We read in 2 Corinthians 8:9 that to be a giver reflects who God is and will result in our becoming more like him. For as we prayerfully let go of our riches, we experience how the act of giving and witnessing the fruit of it of our giving that that the fruit it brings in meeting the needs of others gives us a joy the world cannot know which in turn makes us cheerful givers. As 2 Corinthians 9:7 says, we become cheerful or joyful givers as we experience through the act of giving itself that we gain more by giving than by not giving.
Now I don’t want to say than keeping because I believe a biblical stewardship also includes keeping and saving and enjoying to the glory of God. The problem is when we don’t give partly because we miss out on that blessedness on that holy joy which God has determined that we should experience through the act of letting go. Letting go of the world’s most coveted and warped idol. The very same joy that originates in God’s own being can be obtained by us through the act of giving. Cheerfulness then is not only the way we should give but it’s also the result the reward of giving. It’s as if Jesus said it is more rewarding to give than to receive or you get more from giving than by receiving. Now remember before we move on to the second point, remember that the joy we are speaking of now is a fruit of the spirit and thus a natural aspect of our holiness of our sanctification. When Paul writes to the Philippians, I am preaching through Philippians back home in our congregation. When he writes to them, he talks a lot about joy. He says he prays for them with joy all the time. He wants to help them for their joy in the faith. He writes, “Rejoice in the Lord always.” Again, I will say, “Rejoice.” This is not disconnected from their sanctification process. It’s part of their sanctification process. Blessedness or true joy is one of God’s communicable attributes. And since sanctification is the process of becoming more like him, this includes our steady growth in what First Peter 1:8 calls joy. The joy that is inexpressable and filled with glory. And one of the means God has determined in his wisdom that we should apply in our lives for growing in this blessedness is our regular giving back to him what he has graciously gracefully first given to us.
So do you want to grow in holy joy? Then give generously to the glory of God. Secondly, giving strengthens our trust in God. The second fruit is that our giving, our generosity strengthens our faith in God and our trust in his promises. Now, of course, good stewardship of the resources God entrusts to us includes saving if that’s possible. It’s not pleasing to God. If after I’ve read an inspiring book or heard a powerful sermon, I go to my wife and say, “Honey, I’ve decided I’m giving away all of our savings to that missionary we met met from Africa a couple weeks ago.” That would not be pleasing to God. That kind of generosity is at best reckless and probably sinful as it disregards the Bible’s teaching that we must care for our families and plan for the future and so on. Yet scripture gives warning after warning against placing our hope, our trust, our faith in riches. Paul writes in his first letter to Timothy 6:1 17, “As for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be haughty, nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty uncertainty of riches, but on God who richly provides us with everything to enjoy.” And what does Jesus say in Matthew 6? No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money. Therefore, I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat, what you will drink, nor about your body and what you will put on. It’s not is not life more than food and the body more than clothing. Look at the birds of the air. They neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they are? And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life? Therefore, do not be anxious, saying, “What shall we eat or what shall we drink or what shall we wear?” For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. Therefore, do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious, for itself sufficient for the day is its own trouble. Jesus’s emphasis on our trust in God, on God’s knowledge of his children’s needs and his unshakable commitment to care for them comes in a context that deals with money. Friends, why is money the most warped idol in the universe?
Is it not because the world regards money as the path to security and peace of mind? If you have money in your account, then you can provide for yourself everything you need, everything you desire. Right?
We must understand that greed, the craving for stuff, the craving for wealth ultimately comes from a lack of trust in God. Man believes that wealth will secure for him what God alone can give. Peace, safety, and a bright future. I like Scrooge McDuck comic books. Scrooge McDuck gets pleasure from taking a daily swim in his coins. That’s why he wants riches. He enjoys spending time in the money, taking a bath in them. That is not why the world wants money. That is not why the world craves after riches. They want to achieve the so-called financial freedom so that they can feel free from the burden of tomorrow. The irony of course is that the very condition required to achieve this
so-called financial freedom is spiritual slavery. True freedom is the realization that we brought nothing into the world and we cannot take anything out of the world. As 1 Timothy 6:7 says, “True freedom is understanding that this is our father’s world and that he is deeply committed to his children and their needs.” Understanding this will free us to align our priorities, our financial priorities with biblical principles. One of which is that we are to give away a lot of our
money to sacrifice to the glory of God. But as we regularly sacrifice our earthly riches and resources on the altar of God for his glorious purposes on this planet, we are continually throwing ourselves at God, on God, saying, “God, you have commanded us to prioritize the building of your house, and therefore we trust you to take care of us and our house as we first seek your kingdom. This is not a heretical prosperity gospel. I consider the health, wealth, and prosperity gospel to be heresy. And this is not it. It’s simply the observation that radical generosity strengthens our faith in God’s actual biblical promises. Regular giving is a constant war against the devil who wants us to place our trust in material things. It’s a recurring sermon to ourselves or at least it can be if we deliberately choose to make it so that the sure foundation of our future is not on our bank account but he is seated on the throne of heaven and he is our good father. The Swedish region where I come from is called Smalland which has historically been known not only as the Bible belt of Sweden but
also for its supposedly stingy inhabitants.And quite often I hear Christians jokingly say that that that they are stingy because they are from Smalland. It’s it’s like a running joke. But often
when I hear this, I think to myself, I really hope you’re joking. Because stinginess is not a Christian virtue. Stinginess is not a Christian virtue. Stinginess falls on what Jesus warns about actually in Luke 12:15. Take care and be on your guard against all or all kinds of covetousness. for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions. On the other hand, holding loosely, holding our money loosely, of course, always in light of other biblical principles, that is a Christian virtue. Generosity places us in a position where we are compelled to trust in God. that he
doesn’t command us to give and then fail to provide for our needs, but that he knows exactly what we need and that he cares deeply for us. So let us pray as we give monthly, weekly, however you do
it, let us pray. Father, may the fruit of this act strengthen my faith and my family’s faith in you and the promises you have made to us. and may it weaken diminish our trust in mamma.
Thirdly and lastly, generous giving helps cultivate a heavenly mindset. constantly reminding us that this world is not our true home and that our priorities should be on what is eternal, not on what is temporal. Jesus said in Matthew 6:19, “Do not lay out for yourselves treasures on 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. For where your treasure is, there your heart will also be.” And Paul wrote in 1 Timothy 6:17-19, “As for the rich in this present age,”they are to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share, thus storing up treasure for themselves as a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of what is truly life. Radical generosity not only reveals but also cultivates a mindset, a focus that is awkward. Sometimes when conversations at work, I work part-time in retail. Sometimes when during around the table in work conversations turn to finances and a colleague realizes that my family tries to prioritize giving money as part of our personal family finances and we do this because we’re Christian we are followers of Jesus that calling seems almost provoked almost angry dream and he can’t let it go. Why is that? It is because it doesn’t fit with his worldview. His worldview seems to be it seems as if the act of giving away on a regular basis is entirely counterproductive to everything he values and lives for. because this world is his home and materialism belongs to the very core of his
religion. Now he doesn’t know that he’s a religious but he is. It belongs to his deepest identity. As Paul writes, he sets his hope on riches and not on the return of King Jesus and the reward and glory that Christ will bring you. As he comes, he tells himself, “Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years. relax, eat, drink, and be merry. But Colossians 3:1-5 says to us, to followers of Christ, if you then have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on the things that are on earth. For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life, I love that. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory. Put to death therefore what is earthly in you sexual immortality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness,
which is idolatry. And elsewhere Paul writes to Timothy, “For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil.” It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs.
Friends, how do we mortify the love of money? How do we drain the lifeblood of greed and materialism and worldliness from our hearts? Setting our minds on heaven. We do it by God’s grace, by investing our treasures in heaven, in that which will endure long after everything else has burned up and vanished. in the church of God, in the children of God, in God’s image bearers in this world, and whatever serves their joy and their gratitude to God, the ultimate giver and their good, their eternal good. Scripture teaches that Christians, as Christians, we are to live for the coming age. And giving, regular giving is a powerful way to mortify our natural greed, which is both idolatry and a sure sign that we are way too comfortable in this age, in this world, by releasing our grip on that which the world urges us to hold on to. so tightly we are increasingly liberated from its hold on us enabling us to fix the eyes of our hearts upon the new heaven and the new earth and the Jerusalem above which is free. Puritan Thomas wrote “prefer heaven and the things of it before this earth and earthly things and consider it wasteful saving.” Try to listen to this sentence. “And consider it wasteful saving and holding back when you have an opportunity to grow in your inner self by spending your outward resources. Until heaven is valued above earth, this great argument encouraging acts of generosity and mercy will lose its effects. The love of money corrupts people who otherwise have excellent potential for true spirituality.”
When Judas Iscariot, who according to John, used to steal from the money bag was in charge of, noticed how Jesus didn’t care about how much the alabaster flask could be sold for. He went to the high priests, to the chief priests, and he sold the son of God for 30 coins of silver. And this he did after walking with Jesus for three years and witnessing his miracles and hearing all his teachings. Why did he do this? He did it because he wasn’t heavenly minded. Because he valued this world’s riches
more highly than the glory of the coming world. Continually giving our gold, our silver cultivates an eternal perspective. It is a way for us to do to cultivate what Jonathan Edwards prayed to God. God, give me an eternal perspective. Paint eternity on my eyeballs. Stamp eternity on my eyeballs. It makes us heavenly minded as it reminds us that what truly matters are the matters of our souls. Friend, so much more could be said about the fruits, the the spiritual riches that generosity and radical giving can produce in our souls that God in his grace produces in our souls through that act. I’ve been focusing on only a couple of them. My aim has not been to put a burden on anyone. Uh I want to help you see that God produces the fruit of holiness and sanctification in your life. Not only when you read your Bible, when you pray, and when you gather with your local church and when you sing and when you fast, but also when you let go of your riches, when you give. And I want to encourage you to therefore give more radically to the things of Jesus Christ motivated by your longing to grow in Christ likeness. I think when we cultivate this virtue of generosity in our lives, it will result
in a bunch of other virtues by the grace of God. So let me finish up by praying. Father, I pray that you would help us cultivate this in our lives. Not as a burden, not as something metallic that we do, not as something we do to be more accepted in your sight, but because you are the ultimate giver who has given yourself to us in Christ. That is the greatest gift and that is what we want to live for. So help us do exactly that. Help us live for you. And let us reflect you who are the great giver and let us grow in holiness as we let go of what this world is constantly telling us to hold on to so tightly. Work in our souls. Shape Christ in us as we give radically to your church and to your mission. But also give us wisdom here. Father, you’re you do not command all your children to sell everything they have this instant moment. That is not your call. And I do not want to put a burden on anyone. But help us to view our resources that you have given us in your grace with heavenly eyes and help us see how we can be more radical disciples of Jesus Christ in this world we’re living in. pray so in his name and for his glory. Amen. Amen. Amen.