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Stewarding Friendships, Part 1 by Pastor Kevin

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Tonight I will be teaching our students (grade 6-12) on the topic of stewardship and friendship. The main course of this year is our study on Galatians/James. Supplementing this study is the string of lessons on stewardship. It is our desire as a church to help our junior and senior high students to begin understanding themselves as stewards in this world. 


What is a Steward? 

Stewardship is a lens through which an individual understands themselves and their existence. Rather than seeing themselves as owners (my possessions belong to me) they see their possessions belonging to God, which God has entrusted to them to be faithfully invested for His purposes. If an individual is to live with God in their lives they must come to view themselves as stewards of everything that is precious to them and everything that belongs to them. 


Another way to think of it comes from Randy Alcorn: "a steward manages assets for the owners's benefit...it is his job to find out what the owner wants done with his assets, then carry out his will." Mark Driscoll points out three distinguishing characteristics of a steward (Driscoll, Doctrine:What Christian Believe, 373):



1. "A steward gladly acknowledges that he or she belongs to the Lord" (Romans 1:6).

2. "A steward recognizes that everything ultimately belongs to the Lord." Consider the concept of stealing and how it implies ownership. 
3. "Stewards seek to faithfully oversees all that God has entrusted to their oversight."


Stewardship as Discipleship and Worship

According to Driscoll, stewards are always asking the question how should I be investing my "time, talents, and treasures." To be an individual who faithfully learns to steward these treasures is to worship the God who owns and gives. Stewardship is a key component of discipleship as an individual learns to plan, budget and utilize everything they have for the glory of God. Stewardship requires submission, it requires understanding, faith, trust, wisdom, and fellowship. 


Jesus, the Ultimate Steward

Ultimately, Jesus was the perfect example of stewardship. To quote from Driscoll one last time Jesus was the "most generous giver that the world has ever known. There, he took our sin and gave us his righteousness. He took our condemnation and gave us his salvation. He took our death and gave us his life...He gave us the Holy Spirit and spiritual gifts for ministry service and is preparing for us a kingdom in which ewe will enjoy his generosity together with him forever" (Driscoll, 371).


Connecting Stewardship To Friendship

On the one hand it is questionable whether or not stewardship and friendship should really go together. After all, it is easier to think of measurable, objective things like money and time that we can possess and manage. Thus, friendships are not really something believers are called to steward. 


On the other hand, friendship and stewardship are two peas in a pod (see what I did there?). Friendships are provided by God and they do qualify as something we ought to treasure. God also has instructions for his people on how to manage friendship according to His purposes. I believe friendship is something believers must steward. 



More proof yet is pointing to Jesus as the ultimate steward. What did he steward and for what purpose? Wasn't it friendship with those whom he saved? When wetly about the generosity of Jesus on the cross wasn't it to make friends out of enemies? When he shed his blood and when he died and rose again wasn't it for the purpose of reconciliation with God? Consider this verse from John 15:12-15
This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you.

Drop mic. In all honesty, Jesus was not only the ultimate steward, he was the ultimate friend and steward of friendships. To be friends with the living God is quite amazing and it is the result of Jesus stewarding the task His Father had given him. 

Well, this post is already getting long and we are only halfway through. I want to talk a little bit about what the Bible says about friendships. 

Come back for Part 2


In Christ,

Pastor Kevin

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