Give an Account of Your Stewardship

Summary

The service opened with a reminder that a real sermon is more than information a machine could assemble out of Scripture. A true word becomes rhema, a living word that the Holy Spirit presses into the heart and that touches each person personally. The church prayed that the Spirit, and not human wisdom or ability, would speak. Looking back like Samuel raising his Ebenezer stone, the preacher urged everyone to confess, "Thus far the Lord has helped us."

From Luke 16:1-2, the parable of the steward summoned to give an account, the message pressed one truth: everything we hold - our ministry, our finances, our health, our time - is not ours but God's, and one day we must answer for how we managed it. Many drift through life killing time, never thinking that a day of accounting is coming.

Drawing on Deuteronomy 15, Daniel 6, John 15, and the barren fig tree of Luke 13, the preacher warned that a fruitless life is in danger of being cut down. God allows some to lack so He can test whether those with health, time, and means will open their hands. He closed with a story from Ukraine of a family too poor to have even potatoes, and his own choice to act rather than hide behind excuses.

Key Points

• A sermon carries power only when the Holy Spirit turns the word into living rhema for your heart.
• Like Samuel's Ebenezer, pause to confess that the Lord has helped you all the way to this moment.
• Everything we hold - ministry, money, health, time - belongs to God; we are only His stewards.
• One day each of us must give an account for how we handled what God entrusted to us.
• God sometimes allows others to lack in order to test the generosity of those who have plenty.
• A branch or tree that bears no fruit is in danger of being cut down, so bear fruit while there is time.
• Stop making excuses about cost or inconvenience; visit the sick and meet the real needs around you.