Generosity

I want to start off by saying giving in the Christian life is not so much an external action. Something that we do out of guilt or obligation, but really what we do in response to the love of God and the generosity of God. A generosity that we try to imitate as we seek to be more like Jesus Christ. We know we do serve a generous God. The Bible is filled with verses that suggest God is indeed very generous. Starting with the early chapters in the book of Genesis where Moses writes “God said, ‘I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. It will be yours for food and to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air and all the creatures that move on the ground – everything that has the breath of life in it – I give every green plant for food.’ And it was so.” We see the generosity of God expressed first and foremost in the creation of the world and the creation of man. But we know that God was not somebody who just created and then stepped aside. God continued to be very involved in creation. He wasn’t someone who would create the world and wind it up like a clock and set it on a pedestal and then ignore it. No. He continues to be actively involved in his creation. To continue to create. To renew and to sustain the world. We see this in passages like John 1:16 that says “From the fullness of his grace, we continue to receive one blessing after another.” Or the way Eugene Peterson writes it as “We all live off his generous bounty. Gift after gift after gift.” We serve a generous God who just loves to give. The greatest manifestation of his generosity was expressed in the sending of his son Jesus Christ on this earth, an event that we celebrate obviously Christmas day. So if we desire to be disciples of Jesus Christ, ordinary people that are learning to live like Jesus Christ, and Christ is the incarnation of God in the flesh, then we too will seek to develop a spirit of generosity. In order to do that we have to push aside some false narratives about giving. Many of those false ideas are not only un-biblical but they create this automatic response within us that hinders our ability and our responsibility to give. When we begin to ween ourselves from some of these false ideas and their related automatic responses, we begin to be more generous people because we begin to see that not only is the kingdom of God that Jesus talked about a safe place to live, it is really a safe place to give. What I wanted to do today is talk about some of these narratives and the associated automatic responses that come with it.

The first idea that I think hinders a generous spirit is what I would call the It’s mine syndrome. A syndrome that starts very early in age, sometimes as early as 2 or 3 years old. If you have a child or grandchild that is 2 or 3 years old, before long somebody is going to take something from that child. And what is the response? It’s mine! Give it back. It’s mine! About that time the good parents try to get involved and try to encourage a more civil and positive response known as sharing. But some parents have success with it and some don’t, but the reality is no matter how successful we think we are, kids carry a certain amount of the it’s mine syndrome into the adult life. It begins to manifest itself in a sense of entitlement. I am entitled. Because I have this money, because I have these possessions, because I have this wealth, then I am entitled to use it any way I want for my pleasure. We see it manifest itself in all sorts of ways. An unwillingness to share things like your tools. An unwillingness to volunteer for a nonprofit with the church. Even a hesitancy to put money into the Salvation Army bell ringers. All the while, like a disappointed parent, God is sitting back and saying I wish they would just learn how to share.

I’ll stop right here and say that I know some of you may already be giving a little bit of internal pushback because you say I work hard for my paycheck and so I have a right to do with it whatever I want. In some sense that is true. In another sense it is not because as we are told in Deuteronomy, it is God who gives us the ability to create wealth. Deuteronomy 8:18 says “Remember the Lord your God, for it is He who gives you the ability to produce wealth.” God created us and God gives us the ability to produce the wealth, which basically means we don’t own anything. We are just simply stewards of God’s stuff. A few weeks ago I spoke on the parable of the talents and how the master went away and gave his stuff to his servants to watch over. The master came back and found that two of the servants did a very good job of investing his funds and doubled or tripled the money. The third servant took the money and buried it in the ground because he was afraid that somehow the master would lose money. The master referred to him as a wicked, lazy servant. Again to emphasize we are stewards of God’s stuff. When we realize that, the question becomes not how we can use our stuff to maximize our comfort and pleasure but how can we use God’s stuff to maximize his glory? That requires really a shift in mindset. When you begin to make that shift, you begin to breakdown this it’s mine syndrome and you find yourself starting to become a more generous person. That is the first false assumption.