What a blessing last’s night’s Stewardship Banquet was at First Church! It was great to see many of you and to enjoy a delicious Thanksgiving Dinner by Mary McIntire and served by such a talented group of waiters and waitresses! Special thanks to TJ Austin and his Finance Team and also to Eric Taylor for leading us in worship. Our District Superintendent is always delightful and shared a great word about “The tree in the middle of the Garden.” I shared as well about the 3 P’s of Giving: Priority – God first; Percentage – of total income and Progressive – growing over time! Thanks for your interest and support of the people and ministries of First Church.

I shared personally about what our family will do in terms of our commitment to Christ and First Church in the New Year. I thought you might be interested in learning about John Wesley’s radical lifestyle of giving as well.

Put very simply, John Wesley said, “Make all you can, save all you can, give all you can.” Another quote from Wesley was very similar: “Do all the good you can, to all the people you can, as long as ever you can.”

To give you some example of how seriously Wesley took his own words, consider this. He was one of the great evangelists of the 18th Century, born in 1703. In 1731 he began to limit his expenses so that he would have more money to give to the poor. In the first year, his income was 30 pounds and he found he could live on 28 and so gave away two. In the second year, his income doubled but he held his expenses even, and so he had 32 pounds to give away (a comfortable year’s income). In the third year, his income jumped to 90 pounds and he gave away 62 pounds. In his long life Wesley’s income advanced as high as 1400 pounds in a year. But he rarely let his expenses rise about 30 pounds. Wesley said that he seldom had more than 100 pounds in his possession at a time. This so baffled the English Tax Commissioners that they investigated him in 1776 insisting that for a man of his income, he must have silver dishes that he was not paying excise tax on. He wrote them, “I have two silver spoons at London and two at Bristol. This is all the plate I have at present, and I shall not buy any more while so many round me want bread.”

When he died in 1791 at the age of 87, the only money mentioned in his will was the coins to be found in his pockets and dresser. Most of the 30,000 pounds he had earned in his life had been given away.

John Wesley’s example is a challenging one. He gave away so much more than he ever kept, but he never seemed be lacking anything. His simple lifestyle helped to change his world. Ours can do the same if we too will trust God at a new level. Thanks for ALL you do for Christ and His Kingdom! It’s all that really matters and all that will ultimately last.

Thanksgiving is just one week away! Hope you have a most Happy and Blessed Thanksgiving!
I’m most thankful for you! See you this Commitment Sunday as we dedicate ourselves anew to Christ and His work through First Church in 2012. Blessings!

In His love,
Pastor Mark

PS – This Sunday is also our “Hanging of The Greens”(apologies to any family named Green!) Plan to stay after church for pizza and a decorating party!