10/12/2026
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJq8XQnqF9g
Sermon | The Invitation to Give | Rev. Ann Mann | Barnesville First UMC | October 11, 2026
There is something wonderful about receiving an invitation. Think about the invitations that have mattered most. A wedding. A dinner when you were new in town. A friend who said, "Come sit with us." Someone who opened the door, pulled out a chair, and made room at the table. An invitation says, "I thought about you." "I want you there." "There is a place for you."
That is the story of our faith. Long before we knew to look for God, God was looking for us. Long before we understood grace, grace was reaching toward us. John Wesley called it prevenient grace: the grace that goes before us.
Scripture Reading: Matthew 22: 1-14 (please read on your own)
This is not one of those parables that leaves us feeling warm and fuzzy. It begins beautifully. A king, a wedding, a banquet. The tables are ready. But the invited guests refuse to come. Some are too busy. Others respond with hostility.
Jesus tells this story in Jerusalem, with the religious leaders listening. They know God had called again and again, and people found reasons not to respond.
Notice what the king does next. He does not cancel the banquet. He sends his servants into the streets: "Invite everyone you find." They gathered "both good and bad."
That is grace. That is the Gospel. That is the table of Jesus Christ. Into the beautiful places and the broken places, to people who have it all together and people whose lives are falling apart: Come. There is room for you. We do not earn the invitation. Grace is free.
But free does not mean cheap. The king sees a man without a wedding garment, and the man has no answer. That sounds harsh. Didn't the king just invite everybody off the street?
And that is the point. The invitation is free, but accepting it means responding to it. This man wants the banquet without letting the invitation change anything. God welcomes us exactly as we are. But God loves us far too much to leave us exactly as we are. That is sanctifying grace. Grace welcomes us, and then grace transforms us: our priorities, how we treat people, how we use our time, how we speak, what we value. And what we do with our money.
We have been walking through our 5x5 Discipleship Invitation. We began with our prayers. Then our presence. Today we come to the third promise: our gifts.
It matters that we talk about giving in the context of grace. Christian giving does not begin with the church needing money. Christian giving begins with God giving everything: life, creation, forgiveness, and ultimately His son Jesus Christ.
Giving is not the price of admission. Jesus has already paid that price. Giving is what happens when we realize we have been invited to the table, and our hearts begin to change.
Paul says: "The one who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and the one who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. Each of you must give as you have made up your mind, not regretfully or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver." 2 Corinthians 9:6-7
God doesn't twist our arms. God transforms our hearts. Giving is a spiritual discipline. Every time we loosen our grip and offer something for the work of God, we declare that money is not our master. We say we trust God more than what is in our bank account.
During this focus on Gifts, I am inviting each of us to consider giving an additional five dollars each week toward outreach and ministry. For some five dollars is not much. For others it requires a real decision. That is why the amount is not the heart of the invitation. The heart is this: can giving become an intentional part of how I follow Jesus? Can I look at what God has placed in my hands and ask, "Lord, how can I use this for you?"
Each five dollar bill becomes a tangible expression of grace. None of it is to earn God's love. We give because we are already loved. We serve, pray, show up, and witness because we are already loved. Everything begins with grace.
It is possible to receive an invitation and never open it, to open it and never answer, to come to the banquet and never let it change us. Think of a farmer with a seed. The seed kept in the bag will always remain a seed. The seed placed in the ground can become something more. We do not always get to see the harvest. We are simply called to sow, because God first gave to us.
The invitation has gone out. The table is ready. There is room. There is grace enough, love enough, mercy enough. There is a place with our name on it. Come as you are. But do not expect to remain as you are. The hands that once held tightly begin to open. The heart that once asked, "What can I keep?" begins asking, "What can I give?" And slowly, beautifully, by the sanctifying grace of God, generosity becomes not simply something we do, but part of who we are.
God loves a cheerful giver. And by the grace of God, may we become a generous people.
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