Carnal Motives for Giving 2 Cor. 9:7 CLICK TITLE FOR AUDIO

There are certainly some very spiritual motives for giving, as we saw in the prior broadcast.  These include love, willingness, affection, obedience, joy, liberality, and security.  But oftentimes, we find that giving is carnally motivated.  We want to examine the scripture today regarding these carnal motives for giving in an effort to help you identify them in your life, if they are there.

Carnal motives for giving are usually governed by expedience and limited to temporality.  They are, nevertheless, pragmatic and so men continue to use them and respond to them.  Carnal motives for giving include:

Necessity – 2 Cor 9:7.  Those who have needs are usually children or friends.  Giving just because the need exists without considering the Lord’s will.  Sometimes you should give and sometimes you shouldn’t give.  You shouldn’t give when people need to learn from hardship.  By this, you can create dependence.  You shouldn’t give to lazy people and to free-loaders; as 2 Cor 9:7 says you will begrudge them.  Prayer, time and understanding, usually help you decide when to give and when not to give.  Giving scripturally to meet a need is not carnal [Prov 3:27-28; 1 Jn 3:17-18].  That’s what the Lord directs us to do.

Guilt – Acts 3:1-5.  This isn’t the best example because this poor fellow in Acts 3 had no means of support since he was born lame.  Nevertheless, people often give in these cases to ease their conscience.  Beggars and solicitors use this motive to get you to give.  They make you feel bad because you have more than they portend to have.  By giving you insure that others will have to deal with their haranguing.

Fear – 2 Ki 12:17-18.  Hazael king of Syria set his face to go up to Jerusalem and Jehoash gave him the treasures of the house of the Lord and Hazael went away from Jerusalem.  Many people give only because they are afraid to say “no”.  They fear the consequences.  Many drug addicted children keep their parents in the fear of, “if you don’t give me what I want something bad is going to happen”.  And the something bad is a threat to either do them harm or to do himself harm.  Fear keeps them in your loop of giving even though you know that giving to them isn’t the right thing to do.

Recognition – Matt 6:1-4.  Universities and charities use this kind of incentive to garner big donors.  But when you give for recognition you have your reward down here.

Influence – Prov 17:23.  Political contributions can be an unfair advantage that one voter hopes to gain over other voters because of his contribution.  The problem with this kind of giving is that it destroys the country [Prov 29:4].

Faithlessness – 2 Chr 16:2-7.  Giving to someone you think can help you in a situation where you don’t have the faith to rely upon God.  In other words, by your gift you are demonstrating that you trust the person or entity to whom you gave more than you trust the Lord [Ps 118:8-9].

Selfishness – a perversion of Lk 6:38.  You give to get something in return.  This is the motive used in prosperity preaching whereby you give to God so that he can give you more than you gave and even more than you have.

Conclusion: there are numerous carnal motives for giving, as you can see.  They are not God honoring and they will not be rewarded at the judgment seat of Christ.  As the Lord said in Matthew, you have your reward down here!