Spare Change/How To Make More Than The Big Bucks Week 1

The main point we wanted to get across is that loving money can give us a false sense of power while loving God will empower us to live more meaningful lives. We discussed that when it comes to money God wants us to manage it wisely. Not to be selfish or wasteful. We focused on Luke 16:1-13 (The parable of the dishonest steward):\
“A rich man had a steward who was reported to him for squandering his property. He summoned him and said, ‘What is this I hear about you? Prepare a full account of your stewardship, because you can no longer be my steward.’
The steward said to himself, ‘ What shall I do, now that my master is taking the position of steward away from me? I am not strong enough to dig and I am ashamed to beg.
I know what I shall do so that, when I am removed from the stewardship, they may welcome me into their homes.’ He called in his master’s debtors one by one. To the first he said, ‘ How much do you owe my master?’ He replied, ‘One hundred measures of olive oil.’ He said to him, ’Here is your promissory note. Sit down and quickly write one for fifty.’ Then to another he said, ‘And you how much do you owe?’ He replied, ‘One hundred kors of wheat.’ He said to him, ‘Here is your promissory note; write one for eighty.’ And the master commended that dishonest steward for acting prudently.
For children of this world are more prudent in dealing with their own generation than are the children of light. I tell you, make friends for yourselves with dishonest wealth, so that when it fails, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings.
“The person who is trustworthy in very small matters is also trustworthy in great ones; and the person who is dishonest in very small matter is also dishonest in great ones. If therefore, you are not trustworthy with dishonest wealth, who will trust you with true wealth? If you are not trustworthy with what belongs to another, who will give you what is yours?
No servant can serve two masters. He will either hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.”

Jesus praises the dishonest steward because he thinks outside the box when it comes to managing wisely. He realizes that it’s important to invest the money into something that will benefit him in the end. Jesus warns His disciples that we cannot love two things at the same time. And most of the time the two things that compete with each other are our “stuff/money” and God. It’s important not to love our stuff or money more than God because in the end we can be greatly disappointed.
We wanted to make sure the teens know that having stuff isn’t neccessarily bad. It’s good to have hobbies, passions and to collect things. However, when you love your stuff more than you love God you are left powerless.
We used the California fires as an example. The fires in California wereburning everything, they were demolishing houses, destroying property and leaving people with nothing. And if those things that they lost are the most important things in the world then there wouldn’t be much to live for.
A fire can take away stuff but nothing can ever take away God. God never goes away God is always there, He just might be hard to find. And why is He hard to find? Because our hearts aren’t always focused on Him. And, when we focus, when we invest ourselves in God we receive His blessings.
We are praying that this series challenges young minds to think about the money they do receive even though it might only be a few dollars.