My name is Richard Forman. It is an honor to be given this opportunity to tell you our story about giving. I am a systems engineer at Harris and have worked there for the past 20 years and Laura works part time for a ministry. We have been members of Ascension for the past 18 years and have lived in our home for that same time. We have two children, Bobby and Rachel and they attend school here at Ascension.

Laura and I haven’t always been faithful when it comes to giving. Our priority was us and what we wanted. About 7 years ago we participated in a bible study that taught us how God’s want’s us to live and discovered that a simpler life that includes giving back to God is one of the greatest ways to praise Him and thank Him for blessing us with the privilege to live here and be apart of what we have here at Ascension. After much prayer we decided to make giving a priority. We looked at what we spent money on and determined that we spent a lot of money on things we really didn’t need. We decided that we would not go into debt for anything. I drove my last vehicle for 16 years. Those years without a car payment allowed us to give more and save for a new vehicle without having to go into debt. Over time we continued to pray and increased our giving every year. We give first and live on the rest instead of living on what we make and giving what’s left over. While this may sound hard, especially when there is so much advertising telling us we deserve and need whatever they are trying to sell. The truth is we live very happy fulfilled lives. We may not have our wants immediately but God continues to bless us with more than our needs.

We also believe that it is very important to teach our children to give generously to the church and the poor first and then buy what they want with what’s left over. We try very hard to share what our priorities are with our children and explain to them that giving generously is our first priority. There is a scripture in Proverbs – “Train up a child in the way he should go, even when he is old he will not part from it.”

While I was preparing this talk, I imagined when I get to heaven and Jesus takes me by the arm and shows me how the money we gave to the church helped build His Kingdom and He introduces me to the people who’s lives were saved or made better because we made a choice to pack my lunch most of the time and not go out to dinner as often or to hold off on a purchase and gave that money instead. We normally don’t think in those terms, but the choices we make on what we do with the money God has provided us can mean the difference between a growing, vibrant church that has the financial resources to grow God’s Kingdom and respond to those in need, or a church that only has the financial resources to pay the bills.

I’d like to ask each of you to honestly examine your circumstances, examine your heart and ask yourself, “Am I sacrificing a few wants and giving from what I’ve been blessed with or what I have left over.”

Laura:

When it comes to stewardship of treasure, each one of us is on a journey and each one of us has a unique story or giving testimony that bears witness to the living God. The early part of my journey began during a stewardship weekend like this one.

Several years ago, I remember being encouraged by a couple that stood right here and shared their giving testimony. They spoke about how they knew God was asking them to tithe, meaning give 10% of their income, and that for them to make such an increase required a leap of faith. They described how they acted in obedience and trusted God to meet their needs – which of course He did. Their story encouraged me because I was afraid of giving too much and then later possibly finding myself without enough. That’s when I learned that the heart of giving is really a trust issue. It’s the only area in life where God says to test Him. In today’s first reading from Malachi, God says, “Test Me in this and see if I will not open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you will not have room enough for it.” Giving is an outward sign that we trust God to keep His promise to meet our needs. As for us, Richard and I finally got to the point where we were willing to trust God and take Him at His word. We decided to give 10% of our gross income – the first fruit of all that God had given to us, and sure enough we experienced God’s faithfulness as He provided in unexpected ways.

There have been times when I was not sure how we could give whatever God had put on our hearts and still meet our other financial obligations. However, most often, it is only after we have acted in faith, that we have experienced God’s blessings. We always have to ask ourselves, in what or in whom are we trusting – our own bottom line or an all-powerful sovereign God?

I have since learned that our real fear should not be giving away too much money, our real fear should be if we are investing too little in God’s Kingdom. Jesus tells us not to store up treasure on earth where moth and rust destroy and thieves break in and steal, but to store up treasure in heaven. He is telling us about the safest and only guaranteed investment there is – the Kingdom of God. I’ll admit that our family has made its share of financial mistakes. We have made many purchases, big and small, that we have lived to regret, and we have seen money we invested in the stock market disappear. However, any money that we give to the Lord is never wasted and can never be taken from us. Whatever we have given to God’s work will be ours to enjoy for all eternity. When I really stop and think about how short life on earth is compared to how long eternity is, it’s obvious that I need to change my investment strategy. Now I try to think of ways to shift more financial resources from the here and now to the other side of life so that it will be waiting for me when I get there. I just have to remember that I only have a limited time to do this. When I die or Jesus returns, there will not be any more opportunities to pour into God’s Kingdom. When that happens, my goal is to not be left holding on to too much.

Our family does support different organizations involved in God’s work, but our top priority is financially supporting Ascension Parish as a sign of our commitment to this church. When we give to the church, we are actually giving to our gifts directly to the Lord and we believe that Ascension strives to be a good steward of the gifts it receives.

Thank you for listening to part of our giving testimony, and after you leave today, I invite you reflect on this question: What is your giving testimony and how does it reflect what you believe and what God has done for you?