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To be a disciple you and I live our life through three loves. In the first story that Gary read today where Jesus was asked a question by a lawyer. The lawyer wanted to know what he must do to inherit eternal life. Jesus responded to the question with a question. He asked the lawyerwho knew the religious lawsto go back to the law. What does the law say about what you must do to inherit eternal life? The lawyer said you shall love God with all your heart and your soul and your strength and your mind. And you shall love your neighbor as you love yourself. Three loveslove Godlove our neighbor as we love ourselves. Today is the second Sunday of a three week sermon series on Spiritual gifts. This is our Stewardship sermon series this year. Usually the focus of a stewardship series is on money, that is how we use our money and how we share our money. These are important topics, but this year were looking at Spiritual Gifts. Each week of this series were looking at how sharing our Spiritual Gifts can help us live out one of these loves. Last week we looked at how we use our gifts to love ourselves. I talked about the Inspirational Intersection. This is a place where we discover what God wants us to do and be and what we want to do and be. When we discover our Inspirational Intersection we are completely alive. At the close of worship everyone was asked to fill out a Spiritual Gifts inventory. Who filled out a Spiritual Gifts inventory? Thanks to all who did. All of you who filled out a Spiritual Gifts inventory have received a letter. In the letter we shared your top three Spiritual Gifts, an explanation of these gifts and then how you could use those gifts to serve the community and Chain of Lakes.

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Today were looking at how using our Spiritual Gifts can help us love our neighbor. With that introduction Id like to invite you to get out this devotion that is in the bulletin. This devotion has a place for sermon notes. I counting on the fact that God will say something to you in this sermon that youll want to write down. This brochure has a place for prayer requests. And it has a daily devotion. This week I shared a devotion about the faith practice of anointing. Later in worship were going to offer the ancient faith practice of anointing. Over time Id like to do this every time we share Communion. Many Presbyterian churches dont offer this sort of opportunity. Anointing has biblical rootsand I shared those roots in the devotion. I encourage you to use it. This sermon has one point. God wants us to take risks with our gifts to love people. The second story that Gary read comes from the 25th chapter of Matthew. There are three parables in the 25th chapter of Matthew. Jesus shared these parables on the Tuesday of the last week of his life on earth. The first two parables have the theme of someone going away. Who was going away? Jesus was. Jesus was preparing his followers to live when he was gone. It was as if Jesus was telling his followers, this is how you want to live when Im gone. The story we heard today is called the parable of the Talents. You remember how it goes. A man was going on a journey. He summoned his slaves and told them he was going to give them a large sum of money. One of the slaves received five talents, one slave received two talents, and the final one received one talent. What is a talent? Its a lot of money. In Jesus day a talent was worth 15 years of a daily laborers salary. I spent some time trying to figure out what a talent would be in todays money. According to mybudget360.com the median household income is $50,221. If we assume that a

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person works 45 hours a week and takes two weeks of vacation, then that person earns approximately $22 a hour. If multiplied $22 by 45 hours a week by 50 weeks a year by 15 years a talent is $742,500. If you were the slave who received five talents you would have received approximately 3.75 million dollars, the second slave 1.875 million, and the third slave received 742,000. What would you do if someone gave you a gift of 3.75 million dollars? I probably would wet my pants. Its like winning the lottery. This made me wonder what do lottery winners do when they win the lottery. I found out about a survey that the Ontario Gaming League did. They asked people who had won a million dollars what they did with the money. SLIDE

90% banked the money 65% purchased a new car 60% paid off debt 56% went on vacation 48% shared winnings by donating 38% became mortgage free 36% purchased a house 31% paid for education for themselves or their family. 14% changed their overall lifestyle. 7% bought a boat. Whats interesting to me is none of these folks invested their money. Thats what the

first slave did. The story said the slave traded the money. I wonder how he did that. Maybe he went to the local casino and gambled; maybe he went to an underground stock exchange and traded it; maybe he put a big bet on the Vikingsnonobody would put money on the Vikings. We dont know how, but he parlayed 3.75 million into 7.5 million dollars. He doubled his moneyh

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The second slave doubled his money too. He took his 1.875 million dollars and brought back another 1.875 million. He had a total of 3.75 million. Any financial counselor knows that to double your money means the person has to take some significant risks. These slaves received a gift, they took a risk, and they doubled their money. In these parables in Matthew 25 Jesus was describing the kingdom of God. Its as if Jesus was saying to all of us followersreceive these gifts I give you, take risks with them to help someone. When you do that something special will happen. SLIDE You and I at Chain of Lakes Church are benefiting right now as someone else

takes risks on us. This Tuesday the Presbytery is going to vote on a purchase agreement for a piece of property for Chain of Lakes Church. I fully anticipate that the Presbytery will vote in favor of this Purchase Agreement. We have some contingencies in the Purchase Agreement that have to be worked out before we can close on the property. Right now everything looks good. This vote on Tuesday is a big moment in the life of our new church. I hope that a lot of you will come to this meeting. I think a party might break out after the Presbytery takes this vote. If a party doesnt break out on the Presbytery floor, I think all of us present should just go have a party. Purchasing this property is a risk that the Presbytery is taking for us. You and I are like this little mustard seed of a church. In taking this action the Presbytery is demonstrating faith that we as a mustard seed will continue to grow to become a powerful organism. The Presbytery is betting that our congregation will have a significant impact on the world. I attended the Board of Trustees meeting a couple weeks ago. The Board of Trustees handles the financial arrangements for the Presbytery. They are a group of high powered

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lawyers and financial people who read every word of these Purchase Agreements. Ath the meeting the BoT was deciding on whether to move this Purchase Agreement on for a vote by the Presbytery. I usually am not nervous at meetings, but I was very nervous at this meeting. I kept waiting for the shoe to dropfor someone to make a case that using the funds of the Presbytery they are going to spend $625,000to purchase this property for our congregation was a foolish thing to do. I was expecting that someone at the meeting would ask the question about whether it made sense for the Presbytery to risk their money on our mustard seed of a congregation. Nobody ever asked that question. Ultimately the conversation at that meeting didnt turn to money; instead it turned to faith. The people of the Board of Trustees have faith that God wants a vibrant Presbyterian presence in Blaine/Lino Lakes. The people of the Board of Trustees have faith that you and I as the people of Chain of Lakes Church are going to continue to work hard to continue to develop a dynamic congregation. All people like to have some sort of assurance that they are protected if they take risks. The only protection the Presbytery has is faith. What a great reason to take a risk. The Presbytery could have easily buried their gifts in the ground, but instead they are betting on faith. They are purchasing ground so that ground can be a place for ministry. The night of the Board of Trustees meeting I took a detour on the way home and drove to the property. Its located about a mile from my house. I just couldnt help it. Something was compelling me to go there. I did a prayer walk. It was dark outside. I just walked and prayed. I imagined the ministry that will take place on this property. I imagined how strangers would come to this property and would become friends; I imagined friends becoming disciples; I

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imagined disciples impacting the world. I imagined us living out a call to be an authentic Christian community. I imagined a counseling centerwouldnt it be cool to develop a counseling center based on faith and the best of counseling practices where people who are struggling could be helped. I imagined a gymwouldnt it be cool to have a gym where we could bring back church basketball leagues so that families wouldnt have to make a choice between basketball and worship on a Sunday. I imagined a music academywhen I was in school I started playing an instrument in the 4th grade. Because of budget cuts kids dont take music in school until much later. I imagined our music academy offering music to the kids of the community starting in Kindergarten. I imagined people becoming deeply committed followers of Jesus Christdisciples people known by their love. Thinking peoplecaring peopleserving people. We couldnt imagine this if the Presbytery wasnt willing to take a risk on us. As I said before this sermon has one pointtaking a risk with our gifts to love other people. This sermon has one challenge. I want to challenge all of us to take a risk this week with our gifts to love someone. Theres all sorts of ways we can do this. Part of my task as a pastor is to encourage and even inspire you to take action. Id like to inspire you to take action with another story. This past Thursday I went to a luncheon for Kwanzaa. They are a Presbyterian church in north Minneapolis. Their congregation used to be Highland Park Presbyterian. The people who went to Highland Park Presbyterian were mostly white and the neighborhood was mostly African-American. It didnt seem to make sense for a mostly white congregation to exist in a

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neighborhood of mostly African-American folks. So the white congregation closed their church and invited an African American congregation to start. This took place between 10-15 years ago. John Ivers was one of the leaders of this movement to close Highland Park Presbyterian Church so that a church who reflects the neighborhood can be formed. SLIDE Kwanza now has two buildings. The building where the people at Highland Park

Presbyterian Church used to worship has been turned into a space that houses Northside Womens Space. This is a place where girls and women who have been exploited by sex trafficking and the sex trad can find reest. Its a place where these women and gifls can think and receive services and support. The space offers showers and laundry. These women are offered personal hygiene supplies and testing for STDs. A building that used to be used for worshipnow helps women caught in the sex trade. Alika Gallowaythe co-pastorof Kwanzaa told us a story this past Thursday. Alika is a wonderful story teller. One day she was in the sanctuary with John looking at the stained glass windows in what used to be the sanctuary. She needed some money for the Northside Womens Space. John looked at the stained glass windows and suggested they sell them. Alika was like sell the stained glass windows. Alike shared with us on Thursday that she liked to go to the sanctuary and admire the stained glass windows. Those windows gave her a chance to reflect. John said something that changed her mind. He said that Jesus would rather be among these women caught in the sex trade then being stuck on a window. Selling windows to help women exploited by the sex trade. Thats taking risks with our gifts to love others.

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Why is this message important? Churches are not known for taking risks. We might get this piece of property and we want to think about how we can preserve the property instead of taking risks to love others. r we get a group of people to come to church and we get comfortable with each other instead of taking a risk to outreach into the community. Or we think that our task is to conserve what we have instead of giving away what we have. Most often the default model for congregations is not to take risks. Think about this with me for a moment. How much do you want risk taking to be part of our congregation? On a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being the highest, what number do you want to describe our risk taking capability? Im just asking you this question for the first time so I dont expect you to share a response. I know what my number is. My number is a ten. Im willing to risk everything in order to use our gifts to love others. Im willing to put it all on the table. I think this is very biblical. The first two slaves were willing to bet it all. There was one more slave in the story. He wasnt willing to risk anything. When he was asked by the master what he had done with the one talent, the slave said this: SLIDE Master, I knew that you wre a harsh man, reaping where you did not sow and gathering where you did not scatter seed; so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Matthew 25:24-25 The slave was afraid of his master. The images in this story are obvious. The master is meant to be God and you and I are meant to be a slave. One of the lessons that Jesus was teaching was not to be afraid of the master. Our image of God has a direct impact on how freely we are willing to use our gifts. Its obvious that the slave with one talentthat is 742,5000 dollars in todays moneywas afraid of messing up with his talent.

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The slave with the one talent had internalized his perception of God to be a tyrant. The slave was worried that God would be displeased if he lost the talent. Ironically God was more displeased that the slave did not take a risk. God didnt want the slave to play it safe. God is not a tyrant waiting to pounce on our mistakes. Its as if God is our personal cheering section. Come one you can do it. You can take a risk. I will help you and lead you and guide you. If you fail, then Ill help you get up again. Im with you all the way if you take risks. Its also as if God was saying, if you hide what you have Im going to be very upset. We just have to accept that if we take risks we will fail. God would rather have us fail than to hide our talents in the ground. Abraham Lincoln was defeated in his first try for the legislature, again defeated in his first attempt to be nominated for congress, defeated in his application to be commissioner of the General Land Office, defeated in the senatorial election of 1854, defeated in his efforts for the vice-presidency in 1856, and defeated in the senatorial election of 1858. As an inventor, Edison made 1,000 unsuccessful attempts at inventing the light bulb. When a reporter asked, "How did it feel to fail 1,000 times?" Edison replied, "I didnt fail 1,000 times. The light bulb was an invention with 1,000 steps." Emily Dickinson had only seven poems published in her lifetime. For a professional baseball player to be successful they succeed only three times out of every ten that they hit the ball. They fail seven times every times they hit the ball in play. If that player fails only six times when the ball is in play, they will be a once-in-a-generation player. The last baseball player to hit .400 was Ted Williams in 1941. Would you join me in taking a risk with your gifts to love someone.

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After this sermon were going to sing a song, then were going to celebrate Communion. During Communion were going to offer the anointing ritual and have a Prayer Station. As we take Communion and receive anointing and pray Kellie is going to sing a beautiful song. When Kellie and I met this week she said the words to the song really fit what were trying to do. She encouraged me to read them. The words are beautiful. Somebodys down to their last dime Somebodys running out of time Not too far from here Not too far from here Somebodys troubled and confused Somebodys got nothing left to lose Not too far from here It may be a strangers face But Im praying for your grace To move in me And take away the fear cause somebodys hurting Not too far from here Now Im letting down my guard And Im opening my heart Help me speak your love To every needful ear Someone is waiting Not too far from here Not too far from here is someone waiting for us to risk using our gifts to love the person. When we come across that person this week lets not bury our gift in the ground. Instead lets share our gifts in love. When we do that well be investing in the Kingdom.