Michigan Camp Meeting 2017

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Michigan Conference of Seventh-day Adventists

The Pathway to True Prosperity

3. Meiste & Nephew- Saving is Smart

Heavenly Father, it's another morning and how thankful we are to you for life, to be alive, to be here at Camp Meeting.

And I just pray, Lord, that as we grapple with this issue of stewardship, being faithful stewards of the stuff you've put in our hands, that you would empower us through the Holy Spirit to implement the things that we learned.

It's going to hurt, but Lord, we'll grow through it and we'll be better stewards and then when you come, you'll be coming for us.

And Bless Melissa, she shares, and may we all just go away from this time together, knowing we've spent some time with you.

I want you to open your Bibles with me to Proverbs chapter 6.

So we're going to look here in this passage that Solomon wrote and we're going to look at a couple aspects out of this but in Proverbs chapter 6 verses 6 through 11 we have this passage.

Consider her ways and be wise, which having no captain, overseer, or ruler, provides her supplies in the summer and gathers her food in the harvest.

A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep.

So shall poverty come on you like a prowler, and your need like an armed man.

Go to the aunt you sluggard." Now, there's many aspects we could take this passage into.

You know, the issue of work, which is, you know, God gave us work before sin was here.

He put Adam and Eve in the garden to tend and keep it, it says in Genesis 2.15 if I remember right.

So work is something that we as humans are supposed to be doing.

So he says, go to the ant, you slugger, because ants, they work constantly, don't they?

You know, and what, you ever have ants in your camper?

Yeah, I'm dealing with some ants in my camper.

They're always looking for something more, okay?

And they're always working, gathering, all right?

Now it's interesting when it comes to ants, they do store up.

Ants don't just, well there's a little piece, I'll eat that, and we'll eat that.

Because there's going to be winters coming, right?

And they're not going to be able to go out there and gather.

You know, honeybees are another example of savers.

They will pack, you put your supers on there, you keep putting, they keep packing away honey.

They need to make sure they have enough reserves so that when the hard time comes, they'll make it through it.

Now it's interesting, in the spirit of prophecy, on this passage, what Ellen White has to say, she says, "...the ants teach lessons of patient industry and perseverance in surmounting obstacles of providence for the future." That word providence means thrift, frugality, foresight.

This whole idea of saying, okay, I'm not going to live just for the moment.

Now, granted, we need to live for the moment because that's all you have, right?

You don't have tomorrow, you have right now.

And in that respect, Yes, we live for Christ right now, but we're also supposed to plan, and that planning there is saving.

You are going to store up, you're going to put aside, because there is going to be a time when you might need that extra.

She also says, Solomon points to the industry of the ants as a reproach to those who waste their hours in idleness or in practices that corrupt soul and body.

Now it's interesting, practices that corrupt soul and body.

Remember what I read the other day about debt?

She says that debt is a snare of Satan to ensnare the soul.

So this whole idea of not planning, not saving, will ensnare the soul.

The ant prepares for future seasons and that's what we need to do.

Life can throw you some major curves, can't it?

But because, as she mentioned, they had saved and they had done their planning and what they needed to do, what could have been a disastrous situation financially, ended up not being a disaster financially because they saved.

So what God wants us to do, and I have people ask me this all the time, well, you know, if the Lord's coming, Why do I need to save money?

Well, the counsel we have is that you need to live as though He's coming today, but plan as though He's coming in 50 years.

And This may not sit well with some, but I don't believe you need to have a million dollars to retire.

Because what I believe is this, what you need to retire is a relationship with Christ Jesus.

What you need to retire is good stewardship principles.

But don't wait until you retire to implement good stewardship principles.

And yeah, you need to have a little savings.

But if you're smart, and you're putting all these things into place in your life, when you get to that time of retirement, yeah, you may not be able to lay on the beach in Cancun for the rest of your life.

But that's not what God wants you to do anyway.

You may retire from your employment, but you don't retire from your work.

Because you continue to work, and that work, of course, is the work for the gospel.

So I would encourage you that as we talk today about this issue of saving, and Melissa's gonna talk about some nuts and bolts stuff, some practical things that you may roll your eyes at.

Some of that I do, the whole coupon thing.

And I'm not here to judge any of that, but hopefully you're going to pull away today with some things like, man, I can do that, I can try that.

But the idea is just that go to the ant you sluggard.

But yet that ant in some instances is more intelligent than we are.

They're following the principles that God's placed in a little tiny brain, and they're working those principles out.

If we work the principles out that God is giving us, we'll be as successful as they are.

So Melissa, why don't you take us into saving and smart.

4. McKenney & Nephew- Planning Is a Priority

Heavenly Father, we're thankful for this Thursday morning.

We're thankful for another opportunity to learn and we pray that as we open the Bible today and then as Patty shares with us that we learn things that are valuable that will help us in the days ahead to be faithful stewards and to help others.

All right, I want you to open your Bibles with me.

We're gonna open up to a parable that Jesus told in Luke chapter 12.

Today we're talking about the issue of planning and specifically estate planning and what that means.

We have attorney Patty McKinney with us today.

We're so glad that she was willing to come.

We have the privilege of working with her on a daily basis when it comes to estate planning.

Some of you have worked through your estate plan with us and you probably had Patty, you know who she is, you spoke to her on the phone, now you get to see her face, work with you.

We're going to talk a little bit at the end about what we can do as a conference to help you with your estate planning.

But here we see a parable, and I want to start in verse 13 because Jesus tells this parable after an encounter he has with someone.

So we're gonna start in verse 13, Luke chapter 12, verse 13.

"'Then 1 from the crowd said to him, teacher tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me.

So he's saying hey listen tell my brother to split this thing with me.

So what is that telling you about the situation?

Now, I've been in this field of estate planning for a little over 5 years now, and as a pastor I saw this, but I never have seen it so clear as I do now.

The tension that comes when mom and dad pass away.

Brothers and sisters, siblings that are in perfect harmony before now are at odds.

It says, but he said to the man, man, who made me a judge or an arbitrator over you?

And He said to them, and take note of this in verse 15, take heed and beware of what?

Now, doesn't the 10 Commandments say something about that?

So he says, beware of covetousness, beware of it, all covetousness.

For one's life does not consist in the abundance of things he possesses.

Well That's a direct opposition to what the world tells us, right?

The world says, no, life is all about what you possess.

He spoke this parable to them, saying, the ground of a certain rich man yielded plentifully.

And he thought within himself, saying, what shall I do since I have no room to store my crops?

I'll pull down my barns and build greater.

And there I'll store all my crops and my goods.

And I'll say to my soul, soul you have many goods laid up for many years, take your ease, eat, drink, and be merry.

Fool, this night your soul be required of you.

Then whose will those things be which you have provided?

So is he who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God." Now we've been talking about this this whole week that that everything we have isn't ours, it belongs to God.

But what happens many times is we start to think that those things belong to us, that we own them.

That responsibility is to make sure that we use God's stuff God's way, right?

And when you do look at estate planning, that's what that's all about.

Because don't think that when you die, your stewardship responsibilities are over.

That's why estate planning is so important because you are held accountable still for the things that God's placed in your hands to manage for him after you die.

That's why having an attorney like Patty write up your will or have a trust or something like that where it designates where these things are to go is a very important part of stewardship.

That's why your church, the Michigan Conference, has a plan giving trust services department that myself and Pastor Jean and Mona works in because we realize that's the capstone of stewardship.

So today we're going to talk about a few things when it comes to the estate planning.

Our attorney, Patty McKinney, I mentioned earlier, she practices out of Grand Rapids, lives in Allegan.

She's a wonderful woman, a good Seventh-day Adventist Christian, and she's going to share with us some very particular things when it comes to powers of attorney and probate, but she's also going to be open for questions, okay?

So you have some questions, and we're going to field those questions as we go, so that if we're dealing with this topic you just raise your hand and she'll call and at the end we'll do some more questions okay.

But I just wanted to mention here that when it comes to estate planning, When it comes to this whole situation, the main thing we have to remember is that our life does not consist in the stuff we have.

And I'm gonna give this to you as we wanna record every word.

I'm Glad for this opportunity to meet with you today.

I am grateful for all these friendly faces and even some familiar faces.

Some of my church family from the neighboring church and some of, 1 of my dad's pals is here.

The, our topic this morning is planning ahead.

And as a part of that, I thought that I would talk about a couple of situations that I've encountered recently that just point to the necessity for planning ahead.

As it was said earlier, that our responsibilities don't end at our death in terms of the stewardship piece of things.

I thought that I would talk about a case that I'm currently involved in that points this out in a really big way.

In addition to doing estate planning, I also do some family law work, and I have a custody case right now that involves 4 children who had a terrible tragedy happen in their life just over a year ago.

Their mother, who was in her, she had just turned 40, had a blood clot and had no awareness that she had this blood clot and died.

2 days later, the father essentially died of a broken heart.

4 children and all of a sudden no parents and the oldest child was 14 years old.

Now the parents had thought about who they would want to take care of their children in the event of their untimely death.

And they'd had extensive conversations with an aunt and uncle who had agreed that they would would take the children.

And they'd even gone out and bought life insurance and they named the aunt and uncle as beneficiaries.

They had a large retirement plan and they had even named the aunt and uncle as beneficiaries on this retirement plan.

And the total amount of money that they had left behind was about a half a million dollars.

What they hadn't done was have a will drafted and they hadn't formally designated a guardian for their children.

The family lived in Alabama with no formal documents.

There was a war between the 2 sides of the family.

1 side of the family lived in California, 1 side of the family lived in California, 1 side of the family lived in Michigan.

The aunt and uncle who had agreed to take the children were in Alaska.

So everybody's traveling for this big war down to Alabama to figure out who gets the children.

The grandparents from Michigan are the ones that ended up with the children.

And now there is a war about who's going to get to visit with the children.

Do the California grandparents get to see them?

Do the Alaska aunt and uncle get to see them?

And this is all because there was not the follow through and the planning to do that 1 last piece that would have protected these children.

5. Meiste & Hall- Generosity is Great

Loving Father, we thank you for a new day.

This being the preparation day, I pray that we will learn today in this class and others, but ultimately that our hearts and lives will be preparing for the Sabbath rest that You have provided.

So bless us through this day and the rest of the encampment.

So our first text today, if you'd like to look it up in your Bible, Proverbs 3.

We've been reading a lot from Proverbs, haven't we?

So here it is, Proverbs 3, verses 9 and 10.

Honor the Lord with your possessions and with the firstfruits of all your increase, so your barns will be filled with plenty and your vats will overflow with new wine." So, Proverbs to me is 1 of the very interesting books because oftentimes the first portion of a verse says 1 thing and the last portion kind of contrasts what the first part said.

Verse 9 talks about honoring the Lord, and then verse 10 gives the result of what happens when you honor the Lord.

When you honor the Lord, your barns will be filled with plenty and your vats will overflow with new wine.

And the books that we've been handing out, incidentally we have 2 books that we're giving away, and if you haven't gotten those yet, be sure to see us to get those.

1 of the books has 150 stories of how people have been faithful to God and what has happened when they have done that.

What do you think of when you think of the first fruits?

I'm thinking very specifically in the time that it was applied.

So when God told the Israelites to give of their first fruits, what was that?

We've been talking about that when you make your budget.

What you give to the Lord and what you return to the Lord should be first.

So you don't just give God the first and it really wasn't all that great.

Sometimes we want to keep the best for ourselves.

So if you think of a literal harvest, which is what this is talking about, You don't pick out the spotted and worm-eaten apples and give those to God.

You give God the best of the apples, okay?

So the principle there, not only do we think of God first, but we also give Him the best.

And this applies not only to money, but it applies to our efforts and things like that as well.

Proverbs 11.25, another promise in this respect.

The generous soul will be made rich, and he who waters will also be watered himself." I don't know if anybody has a King James version.

I believe in the original King James it says, the generous soul will be made fat.

I don't know if you're familiar with African culture, but I have some very good friends that were in my church district down in Indiana.

He was from Tanzania and she was from Kenya.

He had a master's degree in electrical engineering.

So they were in my church there and they shared some things about their African culture.

We had quite a mix of cultures in that church in Terre Haute, Indiana.

We also had a lady who was Latin American.

I can't remember what country she was from, maybe Peru or something like that.

Cultures in South America are a little different from Africa.

So, Nvesa is the name of the African girl, said to the other 1 1 day, you're looking very fat.

But you have to understand in African culture, that's a high compliment.

Because that means that your family has their own cow, and they're eating well.

And so they're not malnourished, and they're doing very well.

So when the Bible here says the liberal soul shall be made fat or the generous soul shall be made rich, it's talking about when we give to God we aren't going to lack.

We're actually going to have increase and have more than we otherwise would need.

So I want to take you to a story in Genesis chapter 14.

I'm going to read a few verses here so we can get the story.

You remember that Abraham was called out of his home country by God and he went and who went with him besides his household what other household went along with Abraham?

And so they went out together, and they found that they were too prosperous, their herds were too big, and there was fighting among their herdsmen.

And so Abraham proposed that they separate and they get their own tracts of land, so to speak.

And so Abraham proposed that they divide.

And since Abraham was the senior, he had the right to choose, and so he chose the best and most fertile for himself, didn't he?

He said to Lot, where would you like to go?

If you go to the right, I'll go to the left, and if you go to the left, I'll go to the right.

He gave Lot the choice, even though by hierarchy, it was his choice.

Lot chose what seemed best for him, didn't turn out too well for Lot.

Abraham took the mountain countries, Lot took the fertile valleys.

And so Abraham demonstrated in that instance, and many others, but in that instance, he demonstrated his generosity.

But I want to look at this story because Lot then lived in the plain, in Sodom, And you remember Sodom and all its inhabitants and possessions were taken away captive by an invading king.

And when Abraham heard of it, he took action.

Now when Abraham heard that his brother was taken captive, it was really his nephew but it was his brother in spirit, was taken captive, he armed his 318 trained servants who were born in his own house and went in pursuit as far as Dan.

He divided his forces against them by night and he and his servants attacked them and pursued them as far as Hobah, which is north of Damascus.

So he brought back all the goods, and also brought back his brother-in-law and his goods, as well as the women and the children.

And the king of Sodom went out to meet him in the valley of Sheba." I'm not great at pronouncing these words, so we'll call them what we wish.

Are there any Greek or Hebrew scholars in here?

Okay, we can call them what we wish then.

So, in the King's Valley, it's called, after his return from the defeat of Chedorloamer, Laomer, and the kings who were with him.

Then Melchizedek, king of Salem, brought out bread and wine.

And he blessed him and said, Blessed be Abram of God Most High, possessor of heaven and earth, and blessed be God Most High, who has delivered your enemies into your hand.

Series

The Pathway to True Prosperity

3. Meiste & Nephew- Saving is Smart

Transcript

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