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Shrewd or Foolish?

Shrewd or Foolish?

Words of Faith 10-19-18

Dr. Jeffrey D. Hoy © 2018

Jeff.Hoy@faithfellowshipweb.com

Faith Fellowship Church - Melbourne, FL

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Luke 16

   [8] "The master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly. For the people of this world are more shrewd in dealing with their own kind than are the people of the light. [9] I tell you, use worldly wealth to gain friends for yourselves, so that when it is gone, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings.

 

     Kingdom shrewdness will usually appear as foolishness to the world.

     One year, when our children were little we gave each of them a cow for Christmas. Tiffany was 4 and she named her cow Alice. Jeffrey named his cow Gladys. Andrew was only 2 years old and I think his cow was named "Cow."

     We kept one cow in the Philippines. Yes, it was a mission project for developing nations called "Heifer Project.” Another was in Guatemala and another in Tanzania. Each cow gave its first heifer to another family and then another and so on.

     I remember telling a relative about this wonderful Christmas gift-- cows for our children. And our relative said: When do you get the meat? When does it go to market? They just could not get the idea that we would buy a cow and leave it in a foreign land! Sometimes Kingdom Shrewdness looks life foolishness to the world.

     When our church was founded we began immediately to send money to missionaries. Some would have said that was not very shrewd because we did not have very much money and we did not really know how we were going to support this baby church or pay the rent for facilities. It was clearly not a shrewd move from the perspective of the world. But we realized that if we did not invest in missions we probably ought not exist.

       When our church started, we also realized we needed some pew Bibles even though we did not have any pews. We spent precious dollars to buy brand new Bibles for our worship gatherings. We talked about printing the name of our church on the front of each Bible, you know, so that they would not walk away. Suddenly, we realized that probably was not what Jesus would do! Walk away Bibles? That would be great! So we don't put the name of our church on the Bibles. We invite people each Sunday to take them away. We encourage people to take a Bible if they do not own one. We stamp a notation that the Bible is gift from the Body of Christ at Faith Fellowship.

       We have given away thousands of Bibles over the last 23 years! Many would say that was smart. Not shrewd. Oh? An interesting thing is that we have never had any trouble getting those Bibles paid for. These are the easiest dollars that ever gather. People clamor to pay for the Bibles we use and give away.

       The Apostle Paul wrote to the church at Corinth, “The wisdom of this world is foolishness in God's sight." (1 Corinthians 3:19). Jesus calls us to look for some frivolous ways to influence the world because that is shrewdness in the Kingdom. Kingdom shrewdness is found in any honest means by which we may influence people and make differences that are eternal.

 

         Father God, open my eyes to see things from Your Kingdom perspective. Help me to see the ways that You would have me invest in and influence people for You. In Jesus' name.