I'm Considering the Field

Why am I talking about attaining wealth? Because I don't want you to bury it in the sand. Or they don't talk about this in the parable of the talents. I wish they had a fourth one.

Said he took that talent and he went and wasted it on a lottery ticket. But that's not in the Bible. That's just an example. But that's what many of us do.

We're not even burying it. We're spending it. We're chewing it. But God wants us to plant it so that we can produce something over the years of benefit.

And as I've been thinking about all these different things, the only way I could even teach this to you is I had to expand the limits of my mind and what God could accomplish through me, through my family, and through this church. And so as we've been praying about this, what it looks like to just be wise, I read that verse again. I don't know if you're able to toss it up, but it's that Proverbs 31:16. It says, "She considers a field and buys it.

[snorts] Out of her earnings, she plants a vineyard. " I don't know if this is the Lord indigestion or ADHD or just creativity in general, but when I read she considers a field, my first thought wasn't about a physical field. It was about something the Lord had already started to place in my spirit. And if you look around Buckeye, there is something you see frequently.

What is it? Fields. You see them physically, but this is a mission field. Amen.

Like this is this is a mission field. I came out here because they told me there were 10 to 12% of people in the entire West Valley who go to church, which means there's 88% of people who don't know their left hand from their right. But if you want to be real about it, the people that go to church on average go one every six week, once every six weeks. Which means there's probably some portion of that 12% who doesn't have saving knowledge of Jesus or who's living limited because they don't really know Jesus even though they've confessed with their mouth that Jesus is Lord.

There is a field and I've been considering that field. Not all these fields, though. I'll consider those a little bit too. I considered the field and I realized that I've been chewing the seeds God's called me to plant.

I I've been chewing them. Don't hear me saying that we don't steward the finances. Well, we we've only hired three staff and we're running we had 450 people last week at the church. Um [music] we only have three staff members which is below the the national average.

So we're not mis stewarding funds but I'm thinking through decades, not days. And how do we not just reach people week to week, but how do we have a vision that goes 10, [music] 20, 30, 40 years into the future? And if we're going to be here 40 years from now, what that's going to require is deeper roots. So, I want to talk to you about the future of Orbit Church.

There's a slide behind me. As we consider the mission field in the West Valley, we need to deepen our roots to reach people for decades, not days. And those roots in the future require us to start thinking in the present. [music] They require seeds.

And some of y'all have been asking, "Hey, what's this year end offering going to go to? " And I I just I didn't have clarity from the Lord on it um initially, but the Lord's been working, I think. And Carz, he said something initially that I just couldn't stop thinking about. And then um some other people started asking me questions.

And then I had a mentor of mine. He said, he said, "Every sermon you need to start teaching [music] in such a way that you incorporate stuff that's happening this week, but also stuff that's happening 10 years from now. " You got to cast vision for permanence. And so, as we come together next week, you're praying about the word you're believing God for in the future.

You may be coming with an offering above and beyond the tithe, an offering up to the tithe for the first time in your life, or an offering for the first time in your life. Whatever it is, I believe God's going to bless your faith. And I don't want it to just go into the normal budget items. I want it to go into the future.

I want this year- end offering to be a seed planted [music] that deepens our roots and establishes permanence out here [music] in the West Valley. So, if you go to the next slide, I want to talk to you about what this is going to go to. The proceeds from the year- end offering will go toward establishing more permanence in the West Valley. These funds set us up to act quickly on the acquisition of a midweek space for youth, young adults, small groups, midweek events, counseling toward permanence.

I don't have a place. I've been asking around. I'm in this process where I said, "I don't have a place. " But Jesus looked at me and he said, "Have you looked?

" And so now we're looking. We're trying to figure this out. But I'm like, "God, I don't have the bread. I don't have the fish.

I don't have the loaves. " He said, "Keep looking. " But I I'm I believe in God, but I'm I'm I'm interested to see what happens when I've looked and exhausted, what I end up with, what we end up with. It might be five loaves and two fish, but how many of you believe God can multiply five loaves and two fish?

So, I don't know what it's going to go to. My strategic mind says that when you have 30 plus kids meeting in Carz Gaggin's house, K and Maggie's house, when you have 42 young adults meeting in Kaye and Breckan's house, when you have staff [music] who are about to start coming over to my house every day for office hours, they going to hate that. They go, but it's good. It's good though, Chris.

[music] It's good. Kayle's not here. I'll tell her later. Um, my strategy says that this is a step in the direction of permanence.

I don't know what God's going to provide. He may provide exactly what my strategy shares it. He might provide exceedingly abundantly beyond it. But I wanted to tell you where we're thinking.

We're thinking in the future, not just in the present. So that as you pray about how God's called you to sew seed into this field, God might give you some direction since you know where we're headed. I know [music] I've just I've gone just well I haven't gone over yet, but I'm I'm about to go over and I I I'll wrap this up. But these funds from your end offering mixed with our other reserves that we have built up [music] for this kind of thing will set us up if God drops a miracle in our lap.

I don't know if you've ever thought about that. It's like I I don't have a building. Well, that's a terrible plan, Matt. It's like, you know what's terrible?

When you have a building, but not the funding. And so, I just want us to be ready to act as soon as God drops the miracle. You might say, "This is us planting [music] a seed of investment into the future without knowing what God's going to do, but believing he's going to do it. " And so, that's what we're going to do.

And since I think tangibility like is is helpful as a staff and lead leadership team started to pray and I asked a lot of people for their advice. Um the way I asked them was hey what's a number that you think would operate as a good faith goal for this year- end offering as people give through December 31st? And I started out with like what what do you think people could even trust God with? Like what would take a little bit of faith from people?

[music] And they gave me a number and I was honestly surprised at their faith. Maybe they have a little bit more faith in in [music] the future than I do sometimes. And I heard it and then God convicted me. [music] He was like, "Matt, you got to have more faith.

Stop with this limited mindset that thinks in terms of days and not in decades. Stop being scared to be bold in front of the people that I've called to help seow seed so that we would be established permanently in the West Valley. Stop being stressed about it. recognize I'm a God that has no limits and I'm a God who can multiply five loaves and two fish for 5,000 people if it's it whatever comes in I can use he says so have faith because people in this room have faith and so we started praying about what a good goal tangible number would be and as you pray I just wanted you to know kind of that tangible goal that we think makes a lot of sense you don't know this but we have about um 150 to 170 families regularly attending.

If you expand that to all the people who consistently attend once or twice, maybe three times a month versus every week, we probably way more there. There's a large group of people on our list of people that we connect with and pastor throughout the week that you don't see every single week here. There are a lot more people than you think. And as we just looked at the average attendance and said, "Hey, what would be a little bit of a faith step for people in this room where we landed as a tangible goal for you to pray about that when we all come together this next week and throughout the next month, I've never done this before.

I'm a new pastor. I the tangible goal that I'm believing God for that if 150 of you uh families could simply catch a vision. " Some of you catch um more of a vision. Some of you just take a step of faith.

Some of you just ultimately have faith and allow God to do something with whatever you're able to provide him. This is not a campaign. If we come up with more, come up with less, it's not like we want a campaign. This is a faith offering.

It's simply going toward permanence. So, whatever I give you in a second, if we don't hit it, big whoop. I'll care that people had faith. [music] But because tangibility is helpful, I'm going to give you our tangible goal.

It's going to be right behind me. Go and toss it up. for year end. You know, this feels so weird.

Feels weird cuz um I know how easy it would be, but I also know where we land monthly. And so, it's going to take faith from every person in the room to get to that tangible goal. Um, but I don't know if it was the team being just extra zealous or just me having a lack of faith, but when we sat together on Tuesday and I gave them that number, they were like, "But that could easily be done if just the families in our church trusted God with a little more than the tithe for one month. " I mean, if 150 families gave $1,000, that would be 150.

Um, if 300 adults that are attending today, but the 450 people that were here last week, but the 900 people on our roster and list, that's crazy. [music] If any of them had any modum of faith, we would get there. And so, I think the team felt like we were called to have a faith goal [music] that goes beyond our tangible goal. If we don't hit it, indigestion, but if we do, it was the spirit of the Lord.

And so, that's our tangible goal, 150,000. But here's our faith goal. So, you're you're clapping. Um, and I'm grateful that you're clapping, but this isn't for you to hope somebody else trusts God.

This isn't for you to say, "Oh, man. I want to be significant in that $200,000 number, so I'm going to give more than I planned on. " This is simply knowing where we think God's leading this church. And your role now is to pray to God for a word over this next year and to give as he calls you to give in faith believing that God will do so much more than you would ever do with it in the first place.

And as you leave here, I don't want you to leave here thinking they're just talking about money. This is not a campaign unless you consider it a faith campaign where you're believing God [music] to uh to bust open floodgates when you trust him financially. This is just a year- end faith offering. We'll do a campaign in the future at some point.

I'm sure land's expensive, buildings are expensive. I don't have any plans for that. I just want you to be faithful now. And for those of you in the room, maybe you don't have a relationship with the Lord.

So, this kind of falls on deaf ears a little bit or angry ears because of how I just articulated that. I want you to know that because of what Christ Jesus has done in [music] my life, I confidently and boldly approach his throne. And this is just part of that process for me and for those in this church who have followed Jesus. But if that's not you yet, that's okay.

My number one goal for you is to have faith in the first