As some of you know, I like to golf. In fact, it may be my favorite sport—although tennis with Frank Whaley comes a very close second. Still, I like golf because it may well be the most difficult game to master. In a single round, one might have to use all his strength on one shot and a feather-like stroke on the next. Sometimes you can just step up and hit the ball without much thought. Other times you have to create a shot never before imagined. It is truly a remarkable game.

Yet I have to admit, my game has plateaued. As a kid, I could measure my progress over time, dropping a few strokes here and a few there. Even in seminary, when I played regularly, I could see marked improvements in my scores. But not anymore. If I were to play today on the course I usually play, I would probably shoot in the middle to upper nineties. If I played next week, it would be the same. And if I played the week after that it would be the same. Nothing seems to make a difference—be it the clubs, the balls, the stance, the company.

I share this with you because I think my experience in golf has parallels in our spiritual lives. Sometimes we may have a heart for God, may have a mind shaped by the Scriptures, yet still find ourselves on a spiritual plateau, stuck in a certain place, seemingly unable to grow any closer to God.

Have you ever been there?

I think that was the plight of the two men in our Scriptures this morning. One was a rich young ruler. But he was more than that—he was a faithful follower of God. He not only knew the commandments, he had followed them all of his life, from the time he was just a youth.

Yet here he was, coming to Jesus, asking what he needed to do to inherit eternal life. He had plateaued. He had stopped growing toward God. He wanted more.

So did Zacchaeus. He was a chief tax collector and had done well at it. After all, he was wealthy. But as we heard last week, tax collectors were not nice people. They were traitors to the Jewish people, working as they did for the Roman oppressors. They were corrupt, extorting more than was required so that they could line their own pockets. They were rogues, thugs, intimidating people, even using violence against them. A man like Zacchaeus could hardly do what he did and maintain any true piety, and he must have known that because when Jesus comes to Jericho, Zacchaeus wants to see him. In fact, he is so desperate to see Jesus that he shimmies up a tree like some schoolboy at a July 4^th parade.

Would he embarrass himself so if he were happy with his spiritual life? Would he risk further rejection and scorn if his spiritual life had not plateaued? .

Like us, the rich young ruler and the short little tax collector came to Jesus looking to connect to God more deeply.

So what did they find? What was the key to a greater life with God?

It was what Martin Luther called, "the conversion of the purse." The key to a greater life with God hinged on the relationship they had with their wealth.

When the rich young ruler told Jesus he had followed the commands all his life, Jesus told him he then lacked only one thing. He needed to sell all he owned, everything he possessed, and give the money to the poor. What he needed was to trust God rather than his wealth, but he couldn’t do that.

As Fred Craddock notes:

When given the choice between serving God or serving money, between growing closer to God or surrendering his wealth, he chose to stay where he was, to stay on the plateaued spiritual life.

But not Zacchaeus. When Jesus saw him in the tree, Jesus called Zacchaeus down and invited himself to Zacchaeus’ house. The crowd was shocked. Saddling up next to a known sinner like Zacchaeus was appalling behavior for a man of God. So they began to grumble, but so moved is Zacchaeus by Jesus’ grace that he makes an extraordinary pledge. "Half of all I own I will give to the poor. And if I have defrauded anyone, I will pay them back four times over."

The difference between the rich young ruler and short little tax collector was that Zacchaeus had a conversion of the purse. What mattered most to him was not his wealth, not the comforts it afforded him, not the extras he could buy. What mattered most was getting off that spiritual plateau and growing closer and closer to God. So he let go of his wealth and grabbed hold of God.

The Quaker theologian Richard Foster has said that the conversion of the purse may be the most difficult conversion for those of us in the modern world. After all, we live in a culture that often measures people by their wealth. We live in a culture where we are urged in virtually every moment to make more and more and to possess more and more.

Yet I have found—as most pastors have—that the most profoundly spiritual members of any congregation are people whose purse has been converted. Oh, they may not be the largest givers in the congregation, but they give generously out of what they possess to glorify God and minister to others. They have surrendered even their pocketbooks to the will and work of God and in so doing they have moved off the spiritual plateau and closer to God.

Take Mike, for example. Mike was a businessman and a very good one. He and his wife had done well. But what was more important was that Mike was recognized as one of the congregation’s truly great spiritual leaders. He prayed beautifully, taught wisely and led graciously. Within only a couple of years of joining the congregation he was asked to serve as an elder, to join them in their weekly times of prayer, annual retreat, hospital and homebound visitation. And even among these leaders, he stood out.

But it was not until he was asked to speak during the annual stewardship emphasis that anyone really knew how Mike had become the person he was. During the service he recounted a long history in the church, a passion for Christ, a commitment to Bible study. Yet despite years of effort, he admitted to a sense that God was always just beyond reach, that there was more than what he’d experienced of God. But he didn’t know how to reach it—at least not until some hard times hit. The business he had started floundered and all the security he thought he had suddenly vanished. And he said that for the first time in his life he began to count on God rather than on what he possessed. And in doing so, he found himself deep in the presence of God.

"The business came back and we’ve done all right," he said. "But what I discovered was that it was not as important to me as walking with God. Ever since then, the church has gotten our first check every month."

Like Zacchaeus, Mike experienced a conversion of the purse, the pocketbook. I want to invite you to join them. If you are a guest here this morning, I hope that you will seriously consider how you use that which you possess to the glory of God. But if you are a member, I want to ask you to act. As a member, I hope you received information about our stewardship campaign. In this week’s mailing, there was a pledge card or share card on which you were invited to make your estimate of giving for 2002. I invite you to prayerfully consider your commitment to the work of Christ here. I invite you to ask yourself if you are where you want to be with God and then prayerfully consider taking another step toward a deeper spirituality, toward trusting God rather than money, toward the conversion of your purse to the service of God. I invite you to join Zaccheaus, Mike and a host of others who have found that key to growing closer to God is faithful stewardship of all that we possess.