Give Generously

Deuteronomy 15:10 Give generously to them and do so without a grudging heart; then because of this the LORD your God will bless you in all your work and in everything you put your hand to. 11 There will always be poor people in the land. Therefore I command you to be openhanded toward your fellow Israelites who are poor and needy in your land.

     Give generously. That is hard for so many people. We like to hold onto what we have, what we have earned, the things that demonstrate blessing. So it is counter-intuitive to give generously. And yet this is exactly what we are called to do.
     As the Israelites are preparing to enter the Promised Land, they are faced with a choice. They must choose how they are going to respond to wealth. The Promised Land is the place where God's promise meets God's people. Everything was provided for in the Land. What were they going to do with it?
     Their choice was a simple one. They could hold onto it for themselves or they could be obedient and take care of the poor, the widow and the orphan. They could build bigger barns (to borrow from a parable of Jesus) or they could give generously.
     The focus is on those who are part of the community, connected to the LORD. Fellow Israelites need to be taken care of by the people of the LORD. They are part of the covenant people, which includes foreigners who choose to align themselves with Israel.
     Too often we put labels on those less fortunate. We blast them as lazy in order to justify our unwillingness to lend a hand up. We think "they got themselves into this mess, they need to get themselves out of it."
     I am not talking about enabling bad behavior or encouraging continued wrong choices. "There will always be poor people in the land." We have an obligation as God's people to demonstrate our trust in the God who has 'blessed us with every spiritual blessing in Christ Jesus' in practical, tangible ways. We need to open our hands and let the blessing flow through us.

Money

Mark 12:41-42

      How would you like an outsider doing an audit of your finances to see how you are spending your money? How about if they did it without you knowing it and then making the results public? Some of us might be embarrassed to have others see exactly where our money was going. We might even be surprised ourselves.

      Financial management is an area that we guard very carefully. We have passwords and security questions. We have PINS and keys. But as we have learned, nothing is private. The security we were guaranteed is not secure. Almost every week we hear of another breach. And let’s not talk about Government information security, hard drive crashes, or website vulnerabilities.

      Ever notice how most people put money in the offering plate at church. We put it in an envelope. We fold the checks. We hide the cash in our hand before we drop it in the plate. We generally don’t want people to know how much or how little we are giving. We consider it a private matter, something for our eyes only. We get offended is someone is looking over our shoulder watching us, trying to see how much we are giving. We would call them rude, or intrusive.

      But this is exactly what Jesus does. He places Himself right by the offering plate and watches what people put into it. Back then, in the Temple in Jerusalem, there was a box with a slot in the top, a secure place to place your money. When it was full, it was the job of certain people to empty the box and account for what was given. Then the money was to be distributed for the care and maintenance of the Temple.

      So Jesus stands right by this box and watches people put in their money. It had to be cash. No paper money, only coins. No checks were allowed, no online giving, no credit cards accepted. You could see if someone was putting a lot in because coins make noise and take time to put through the slot.

      But some people wanted everyone to know that they were putting lots in, so they would figure out ways to emphasize how much they put through the slot. I could imagine someone standing next to the box and dropping one coin at a time, delaying the line. Or maybe they released them in a quick succession, dropping them from their hand, one after another, machine gun style.

      Some people would barely want to be noticed. They would sneak up, sheepishly putting their hand over the hole, dropping their money, and then quickly rushing away. They didn’t want to be noticed. Their giving was not about that.

      The same thing happens today. Wings on buildings. Streets and schools named. Money given with the press conference, cameras flashing, bands playing, just the right people framing the podium, a few smiles, a few hands shaken, and off they go. A pittance given for publicity. When was the last time someone gave it all and didn’t want any recognition? When was the last time someone gave it all away? Maybe the current Pope’s actions have something to say about wealth.

Whose Image?

Mark 12:15-17

      Have you ever felt like you had to be careful what you were going to say? Like you were walking on eggshells? You want to say something, but you feel like you can’t, like the other person is sure to hear it the wrong way and get offended. Maybe you feel like they have a chip on their shoulder, or thin skin, like not matter what you say, they will use it as an excuse to attack you, and claim you were attacking them.

      There have been several reports in the news lately about the effects of political correctness on public debate. Because one side has become ultra-sensitive to any hint of injury of any kind, and they wield the power of the “intolerant” card, civil debate is becoming a thing of the past. When you can’t express an opinion because that opinion is deemed illegal, unlawful, or intolerant (to use the new language of control), then only one side has the ability to express itself freely.

      We should be able to state the truth without fear. We should be able to recount all the attacks that have taken place and say that Muslims were behind them all. That is a fact. Let’s not try to sugar coat it. When a quarter of Muslims believe that suicide bombings are justified, that means 250,000,000 people around the world have the ideology of those who continue to attack us and each other in such brutal ways as beheadings and roadside bombs. It is not a small number of extremists when a quarter of a billion people believe it.

      Jesus isn’t afraid to tell it like it is. These two groups of political enemies have come in an effort to trip Him up. Jesus calls them on the carpet. He responds with the truth. He names the motive. He doesn’t take a poll and listen to the election cycle politics. No focus group feedback for Him. He knows what they are up to and He puts it on the table. He names the elephant in the room. We could use more of this today, couldn’t we? (We can say that ISIL in Iraq is a Muslim group.)

      Jesus has them bring Him the coin in question, a coin with Caesar’s image on it. He tells them to give Caesar his place in society by giving him what his government demands. And at the same time Jesus says there is something with God’s imprint that should be given to God. So what is to be given to God?

      I think the object to be given to God is our selves. This is an over-arching theme of the Scriptures. The LORD doesn’t need sacrifices since He owns everything. No image can represent Him. And yet WE are made in His image and after His likeness. He is stamped on every fiber of our being. I imagine if we could read the code correctly, somewhere in our DNA it says, “Made By God” clearly and in every language.

      Perhaps we are supposed to give ourselves to the LORD! There are things that get given to governments. The IRS gets to execute that mandate. But what we give to God must be given freely and without any arm twisting or threat of bodily harm. Worship in giving can’t be compulsory, whether it is giving of money, time, or our life. Islam holds a very different view, a view from the end of a sword.