generosity

All Good Gifts

/ JJS / 2 Comments

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Today’s readings (click to open in new window):
Psalms 96; 146, 2 Samuel 23:13-17b, 2 John 1:1-13, John 2:1-11

In the Gospel of John, Jesus performs his first miracle (John calls them “signs”) at a wedding in the town of Cana. At his mother’s urging,  he reluctantly turns water into wine because the wedding has run out. The chief steward of the reception, upon tasting the wine that was formerly water, tells the bridegroom: “Everyone serves the good wine first, and then the inferior wine after the guests have become drunk. But you have kept the good wine until now.” This tells us a lot about the nature of generosity and giving.

It tells us God’s gifts are top quality – always! When a prayer isn’t answered how we want or expect, or when God calls us to do something difficult or unpleasant, the problem is not with the gift. When we feel like asking “Is this really what you meant to give me, Lord?” the problem may lie in our perception. Not that every hardship is a gift in disguise; God certainly doesn’t give us cancer or domestic violence. But if we approach life as though the Spirit is nudging us toward wholeness, invaluable life lessons and spiritual riches abound. When someone gifts us with lessons – music, tennis, foreign language – the gift is only valuable after we have put the work in.

What about gifts we give? Do we hold back the good wine? While we can’t give beyond our means, we shouldn’t cheap out because we are giving to charity. We’ve all heard: “They should be grateful to get anything at all” and we’ve all seen 10 year old cans of cocktail onions on food drive collection tables. The point is not to judge the giving of others, but to be faithful about our own. We don’t know when someone is giving despite their own need, and we should be wise about stewarding our funds, but when we are giving in Christ’s name let’s keep in mind that in God’s eyes the recipients are no more or less deserving than we are. The good wine – or at least the best wine we can afford to share – is for everyone.

Comfort: God’s gifts to us are never lacking.

Challenge: For one week, set aside a food bank donation (in cash or kind) equivalent to your own lunches. At the end of the week, note whether the donation came out of your excess, or whether you had to scale back a little to give an equal amount. If your present circumstances don’t permit for donations, try splitting your leisure time evenly between your own activities and helping others.

Prayer: Lord, teach me to be generous, and to give with a loving heart. Amen.

Discussion: We can have complex feelings around gift-giving, especially when they feel obligatory, such as during the holidays. How do you feel about gift giving?

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Love Generously

/ JJS / Leave a comment

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Readings: Psalms 18:1-20; 147:12-20, Amos 9:1-10, Revelation 2:8-17, Matthew 23:13-26

Have you ever wondered why gold is such a valuable currency? It boils down to a few reasons: it doesn’t corrode or react easily with other substances; it’s rare but not too rare; it melts at a high enough temperature to be stable but not so high as to be unworkable; and it is an easily identifiable color. Most importantly, it is valuable because we agree it is.

When Jesus chastises the temple officials by calling them “blind guides” because they teach the faith without comprehending it, he says they value oaths made on the gold in the temple more than oaths made on the temple itself. He asks: “[W]hich is greater, the gold or the sanctuary that has made the gold sacred?” (Matt 23:17). Knowingly or not, these leaders had agreed on what they valued most, and they chose poorly.

Our time and energy are our most precious currency, each minute a coin we choose to spend in some way. What have we agreed deserves our investment? The treasures we gather up in life are only valuable if they are made sacred by the love and faith surrounding them. If our money doesn’t go toward helping those in need, if our home is not open to those seeking shelter, if our larders are locked away from the hungry … of what value are they? If their only value is in the having, then we are like dragons afraid to leave our cave because the world might sneak in and steal our hoard. Gold is nothing but a heavy, beautiful shackle until we bring our treasure to the temple where it can be converted to the limitless currency of love. We must spend it to make more.

True agape love does not corrode and is not eroded by circumstance. It is rare, but not so rare we can’t mine it within ourselves. It is malleable enough to suit many needs, but stable enough to be reliable. People know it when they see it. Perhaps the whole world does not agree on its value, but within the temple of Christ’s body,  it ransoms the world.

Comfort: Our treasure is not measured by what we keep, but by what we give away.

Challenge: If you don’t already do so, consider pledging a small monthly amount to a charity of your choice (other than or in addition to your church).

Prayer: Loving God, I commit my treasures to your service. Amen.

Discussion: What types of investment do you consider to be wise ones?

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Last Man Standing

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Today’s readings (click below to open in new tab/window):
Psalms 116; 147:12-20, Zephaniah 3:1-13, 1 Peter 2:11-25, Matthew 20:1-16

Jesus told a parable about a landowner who hired some men to work in his vineyard. He hired one group in the morning, another group around noon, and a third group late in the afternoon. Each of them agreed to the same payment of one denarius, an average day’s wages. The first group grumbled when they were not paid more than those who had worked only an hour, but the landowner reminded them they had agreed to a sum, and he was free to be generous with his money as he saw fit.

This parable is about how God’s grace is not something earned, but something given freely and equally. There’s a short bit in the middle that might deserve a little more attention than it usually gets. When the landowner asks the late shift why they stood idle all day, they answered “Because no one has hired us.”

There’s no indication they were less worthy of being hired. It seems the landowner himself had passed them over without notice earlier in the day. We don’t know why they were left waiting. The fact that they were demonstrates something we tend to minimize: not everyone is treated the same. It’s tempting to start rationalizing why they might not have been hired – what it was they might have done differently – but why is that? We are attracted to the prospect of getting what we deserve. Random unfairness offends us; it jars us when people who work less hard get more (though we’re less bothered by people who work harder and get less).

We assume idling is laziness, but the truth is many people through no fault of their own are left standing in life’s line while others are invited to skip ahead of them to participate more fully in life’s bounty. This line jumping is not always random; the invitations are extended by other people, and people are not without bias. Throughout history through the present day, ethnicity, gender, ability, and social standing have influenced who gets an invitation, but we’ve always wrapped those biases in a veneer of merit.  Any given individual might be an exception, but the trend holds.

When for decades upon decades bias has consistently left entire communities standing until late in the day, it is not just in a Biblical sense to insist they figure out on their own how to make do with a fraction of what others have had many more generation’s opportunity to earn. When real-world equivalents of the landowner seek to offer them what is just in the long term instead of what we seems fair in the short term, those among us who were hired early in the day (as individuals or as members of a community that’s been making the selections) ought not grumble like we’re the ones who’ve been cheated out of wages.

A full measure of grace is extended to all who show up to accept it. If we are to conform our hearts to Christ’s heart, shouldn’t we learn the first person hired is not more deserving of generosity than the one left to wait?

Comfort: Whether you are first or last in line, God offers the same grace.

Challenge: When you assume someone is lazy or undeserving, challenge your own assumptions. about their life experiences.

Prayer: I love the LORD, because he has heard my voice and my supplications. Because he inclined his ear to me, therefore I will call on him as long as I live. (Psalm 116:1-2)

Discussion: When has someone made incorrect assumptions about you? What were the consequences? Did you correct them?

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Multiplied

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Today’s readings (click below to open in new tab/window):
Psalms 51; 148, Ezra 7:27-28, 8:21-36, Revelation 15:1-8, Matthew 14:13-21

When we think about the origin of Holy Communion, we generally reflect on the Last Supper, or the Words of Institution from the Gospels or 1 Corinthians. These passages recollect Jesus comparing the bread and wine to his body and blood, and asking his disciples to remember him by doing the same.

Yet the association between Jesus and bread doesn’t begin with the Last Supper. In John’s Gospel, Jesus refers to himself as the Bread of Life. And in all four Gospels, we read the story of feeding the multitudes with loaves and fishes. In two of them, it happens a second time.

In Matthew’s telling of the first feeding, the disciples were ready to dismiss the crowd because it was late and everyone was hungry. Instead Jesus told the disciples to feed them. The disciples, having only five loaves and two fish, were naturally skeptical but did as he ordered. As the familiar story goes there were a dozen baskets of food left over after five thousand men plus women and children ate their fill.

Isn’t this the essence of the church in action? We don’t dismiss people in need to return after they’ve fended for themselves, but greet them with inclusive hospitality. Even more, we meet those needs trusting not in numbers and naysayers but in the power of Christ to multiply our efforts beyond what we can imagine on our own. And through all of it, we share the message of the Kingdom of Heaven in both word and deed. As the disciples didn’t simply keep what they had to split among themselves, we know our resources do not exist for our own benefit, but to enable us to serve others.

The time we spend remembering Christ while receiving communion is only half the way we honor him. The other half is in trusting him to use us to turn that morsel of bread into a feast for the world. The love and mercy we receive are meant for more than hoarding and sharing only among those who already know Christ. Let us trust they are resources that won’t be depleted but multiplied as we share them.

Comfort: When what we have is blessed by Christ, it will be more than enough.

Challenge: Trust that Christ has a vision greater than yours.

Prayer: Lord, thank you for welcoming me to your table, and for the opportunity to welcome others. Amen.

Discussion: Have you ever been able to do more with your resources than you would have thought possible?

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Sow Bountifully

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Today’s readings (click below to open in new tab/window):
Psalms 122; 149, Deuteronomy 29:2-15, 2 Corinthians 9:1-15, Luke 18:15-30

“The point is this: the one who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and the one who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.”

Paul wrote these words to the church in Corinth to encourage them to give generously to the church in Judea, which needed much assistance. He told the Corinthians that God, who was the ultimate source of all they had to give, would reward them for their faithful generosity. What the audience of Paul’s letter may have missed was Paul’s generosity toward them. The generosity Paul exhibited toward the Corinthian church was not one of pocket, but of spirit. We can see this in his words:

Now it is not necessary for me to write you about the ministry to the saints, for I know your eagerness, which is the subject of my boasting about you to the people of Macedonia, saying that [you have] been ready since last year; […] But I am sending the brothers in order that our boasting about you may not prove to have been empty in this case, so that you may be ready, as I said you would be.

Paul simultaneously praised them for their generosity and gently nudged them to fulfill their promise. He could just have easily written “I’m not sure you’re keeping up your end of the bargain, so I’m sending some heavies to follow up.” This blunt approach has a certain appeal, and it may even get results, but it is not relationship-oriented. In the long run it leads to giving that is more fearful than cheerful.

Do we sow our seeds of faith in others as bountifully as we sow material seeds? Would you rather hear “I’m counting on you; I believe you can do it!” or “I’m counting on you; don’t let me down!” One may ask what the difference is, but the first implies an expectation of success and the second an expectation of failure. People’s behavior is influenced by the expectations we set for them. Intentionally and bountifully sowing seeds of high expectation, even when we doubt, is a sign of a generous spirit.

Comfort: Generosity is its own reward.

Challenge: Treat people as if you believe in their willingness to do well, even when you doubt.

Prayer: Create in me a generous heart, O God! Amen.

Discussion: What’s the difference between being optimistic and being gullible?

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Year Six

/ JJS / Leave a comment

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Today’s readings (click below to open in new tab/window):
Psalms 93; 150, Deuteronomy 15:1-11, 1 Timothy 3:14-4:5, Matthew 13:24-34a

Deuteronomy is one of those Old Testament books some Christians like to pick and choose from when it comes to identifying sins. We come up with complex academic, theological, and just plain arbitrary reasons to separate the rules we want enforced from the ones we don’t. We cling tightly to sexual sins, but don’t seem to have much problem anymore with usury (charging interest on loans), divorce, or mixed fabrics. Many times the distinction seems to boil down to whether the people committing the sin in question can be identified as “them” rather than “us.”

When’s the last time you heard Christians debating whether we should still observe remission? Since it would cost us money, probably not ever. Remission was the practice of forgiving loans every seven years. And it wasn’t just the act, but the spirit that was important: Deuteronomy warns against denying a loan in year six just because year seven is around the corner. Imagine what incredible relief that sort of financial amnesty meant for the poor. How does it compare to our current attitudes about debt, the poor, and generosity?

Since we follow a Christ who said “give to all who ask of you” (Luke 6:30 and Matt 5:42), why are we more likely to trot out passages about sexual transgressions than Deut 15:7-8 (“Do not be hard-hearted or tight-fisted toward your needy neighbor. You should rather open your hand, willingly lending enough to meet the need, whatever it may be’”) or 15:11 (“Since there will never cease to be some in need on the earth, I therefore command you, ‘Open your hand to the poor and needy neighbor in your land.’”)? Why do we demand religious-based legislation about what people can do with their bodies, but chafe under legislation that touches our wallets to aid the poor?

That sixth year admonition emphasizes how much God desires us to examine and correct our own hearts, even when it doesn’t make financial sense, and to cultivate an attitude of Christ-like generosity. Grace is not an equation like compound interest; the more you give, the more you get.

Comfort: The more generous you are, the more generous you will want to be.

Challenge: Try to think of generosity as something that benefits the giver spiritually as much as it benefits the recipient materially.

Prayer: God of grace and abundance, create in me a clean and generous heart. Amen.

Discussion: What’s the most generous gift someone has given you?

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The Fringe

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Today’s readings (click below to open in new tab/window):
Psalms 123; 146, Hosea 12:2-14, Acts 26:24-27:8, Luke 8:40-56

A leader of the synagogue named Jairus moved to the front of the crowd to fall at Jesus’ feet and beg him to heal his dying daughter. Among the crowd who followed Jesus to Jairus’ house was a woman who’d suffered incurable hemorrhages for twelve years. She timidly touched the fringe of his robe, and was instantly healed. When Jesus asked who touched him, the woman tried to hide. After he asked a second time, she fell trembling before him. Jesus said to her, “Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace.” Afterward Jesus continued on to the house of Jairus, and though many said the girl had died, Jesus said to her, “Child, get up!” and she did.

Jairus, a man and a religious leader, did not hesitate to force his way through the crowd and demand Jesus’ attention. By contrast, the woman’s ailment would have rendered her unclean; approaching Christ directly would have been unthinkable for her. It was no wonder she hid when he called her out, because according to her culture she should never have touched him and could have been punished. Instead, Jesus stopped to call her Daughter, and bid her go in peace.

Is our society so different? Privileged people still move to the head of the line and ask for what they need, and we usually get out of their way. The less privileged are pushed to the edges, and frequently shamed simply for asking. Whether it’s cash or a voice or a vote, too often we suspiciously insist they justify their requests in ways we’d never expect of the financially or socially affluent. We’ll fork over chunks of cash for a new church social hall, but want reckoning for every dime of grocery assistance. We call them “takers” then wonder why they’d rather hustle than be humiliated. Somehow we are more sympathetic to the poor halfway around the world than the homeless living under a bridge downtown.

Jesus was respectful of everyone in need, regardless of privilege. If we call people out, let it be to say, “Go in peace!”

Comfort: When you are in need, it’s all right to ask.

Challenge: While accountability is important, try to follow your more charitable impulses.

Prayer: God of abundance, help me to remember more for others does not have to mean less for me, and let me be willing to share when others have none. Amen.

Discussion: What’s your favorite charity and why?

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Money for Nothing

/ JJS / 1 Comment

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Today’s readings (click below to open in new tab/window):
Psalms 15; 147:1-11, Judges 18:16-31, Acts 8:14-25, John 6:1-15

The “prosperity gospel” teaches that if we give our resources (usually money) to God, God will reward us several times over in kind. Some preachers sell this idea through a basic list of proof texts, usually neglecting the proper context. Worse, they reduce faith to a transaction or formula ($1 x God = $10), and when people who faithfully put up money don’t realize a material return, their faith is called into question. Think about it: with all the spiritual difficulties Jesus assures us attend wealth, wouldn’t bestowing wealth almost be a punishment? Fortunately, Acts and John teach us some real truths about the nature of giving and resources in God’s kingdom.

When Simon, a magician-turned-convert, saw the apostles’ power to impart the spirit by laying on hands, he offered them money for the same power. Peter’s reaction is unequivocal: “May your silver perish with you, because you thought you could obtain God’s gift with money!” Maybe Simon mistook the disciples’ practice of pooling resources for a membership fee, but his understanding of the relationship between faith and giving was seriously flawed. No one can buy grace or power. We do not give because we expect a return of wealth or status; we give because a relationship with God prompts generosity.

The miracle of the loaves and fishes is told in all four gospels. Beyond a sign of Christ’s power, this event teaches us no resource is too small in God’s kingdom. Like Andrew – who asked “But what are they among so many people?” – our expectations of God can be surprisingly low. Faith is not about outcomes, but trust. We should first have faith that when we act in God’s name, our resources will be abundant. This differs from the prosperity gospel because we believe God will use resources given in good faith to increase the kingdom, not our personal bank accounts.

“Believe and receive” is a misleading simplification of our faith in a God who provides for our needs. We are not called to a faith that bribes God to action, but to actions confident in a faith God has already provided.

Comfort: Our generosity is a grateful response to God’s generosity.

Challenge: Meditate on whether your giving fully reflects your gratitude.

Prayer: God of renewal, I offer generosity in thanks for your many gifts.. Amen.

Discussion: Money isn’t the only way people try to by favor. What other ways have you seen?

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