Generosity

God loves a cheerful giver (2 Corinthians 9:7).

King Ahab ruled the northern nation of Israel during the years that Elijah was God’s prophet. The prophet and the king did not get along with each other, because Ahab and his wife Jezebel worshipped Baal instead of the true God. Ahab and Jezebel were powerful monarchs, but they were also notorious sinners.

One example has to do with Naboth’s vineyard. The vineyard was close to Ahab’s royal palace, and the king wanted the land for a vegetable garden. He offered to buy the land from Naboth but his offer was refused; Naboth would not sell land that had been in his family for generations. This reversal left Ahab sulking and unwilling to eat; it was his wife who finally engineered a solution. She signed Ahab’s name to letters organizing a party and inviting Naboth to attend. She arranged to have two liars seated across the table from Naboth, and in front of the leaders of the community they swore that Naboth had cursed both God and the king. On the testimony of these two men, Naboth was immediately dragged out and executed, and the palace claimed his vineyard. King Ahab’s greed resulted in forgery, malicious gossip, the death of an innocent man, and the loss of a family’s inheritance.

Our world needs more generosity and less greed. Employees who are perfectly happy with their duties at work seek promotion to more stressful positions simply to earn a bigger paycheck. People run up thousands of dollars in credit card debt because they are addicted to shopping, and end up filing for bankruptcy or taking out a second mortgage on their home. People of all ages fill their homes with toys they don’t play with, clothes they don’t wear, CDs they don’t listen to, and collectibles that only collect dust. Others are always replacing cars and upgrading their electronic equipment because they've got to have the newest thing.

Where is the generosity? How many people give regular donations to charity? How many churchgoers follow the Old Testament example of giving 10% of their income to the Lord? How many children are willing to share and share alike? How many people are willing to give up their place in line for someone who’s in a hurry? How many folks give away things they no longer want, instead of selling them through a second-hand store?

In our modern world, charity has gotten a bad name. Some people abuse charity, applying for help they don’t really need. Many others refuse charity. In some cases, accepting charity makes them feel like a failure; in other cases, they just don’t want to be a burden that someone else has to care for. But from God’s perspective, we are all charity cases; without His generosity, we would all be condemned eternally.

We are saved from sin and death because God is generous. He sent his Son to suffer and die to pay off our debt of sin. When Jesus rose from the dead, it was so that He could offer us the gift of forgiveness whenever we mess up. Incredibly, this gift of mercy is completely free; Jesus does not demand anything from us to repay Him for His sacrifice. This is a good thing, because there is no way anyone could repay Him for the hell He suffered on the cross as our substitute.

Because the Lord has been so generous with us, it is only right that we should be generous as well. One of the hallmarks of Christian living is a willingness to share the good things we have received from God. Of course, that includes pretty much everything. Scripture tells us, Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights (James 1:17). This also includes money, as Moses reminds us: remember the LORD your God, for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth (Deuteronomy 8:18).

What does generosity look like? It wants to share God’s gifts instead of hoarding them away for private use; it rejoices in God’s blessings and wants to share that joy with others. It is willing to give even when there is no real likelihood of ever being repaid. Generosity does not live in fear of giving too much away, because it trusts the Lord to provide even in times of need.

Greed gets in the way of generosity. Greed takes many forms. For a collector, it’s about assembling a complete set of something. For the self-indulgent, it’s about having the newest, the best, or the most expensive. For someone who is fearful, it’s about having such a big enough stockpile that no matter what happens he will never be in need. Of course, the pursuit of such goals leaves nothing to offer the needy.

Jesus addressed greed in His parable of the Foolish Rich Man. In His story, Jesus describes a farmer who is blessed with a record-breaking harvest. There is such an abundance that his barns cannot contain it all. But is the man generous? Does he donate the excess to feed the poor? Not at all! He decides to tear down his barns and put up bigger ones. His goal? He wants to retire and live the high life, supported by his accumulated wealth. Even though his fields are productive and he still has the strength to continue farming, he is not interested in raising more crops to feed his fellow man. But God condemns the farmer for being tight-fisted; He says you fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself? (Luke 12:20) Jesus wants us to understand that God gives to us so that we can share with others.

Generosity is, at heart, a spiritual attitude. The generous person sees money as a way to support the work of saving souls from unbelief and hell; this is why such a person actively supports churches and mission work. The generous Christian sees charity work as an opportunity for sharing the faith with others; this is why such a person volunteers her time in places that serve the poor and hungry. The generous person wants to thank God in a tangible way for all of His wonderful blessings.

Abraham serves as an example of generosity. Abraham, his wife Sarah, and his nephew Lot had grown up in a land hundreds of miles from Canaan. But God told Abraham to gather his family and started walking, because Abraham was going to become the father of a great nation. Eventually, the group arrived in what would one day be called Israel.

Abraham and Lot were cattlemen; they lived in tents and frequently moved to provide their herds with fresh grazing land. The Lord blessed Abraham and his family; the size of the herds grew, as did the number of people required to tend them. But this remarkable growth created a problem—the herds began competing for limited resources. God had promised Abraham a great nation; no such promise had been made to Lot. Abraham was in the driver’s seat—he could have told Lot to take his family, his herd and his servants and go graze somewhere else. But that’s not what Abraham did; instead, he gave Lot first choice as to grazing rights; he said, Is not the whole land before you? Let's part company. If you go to the left, I'll go to the right; if you go to the right, I'll go to the left (Genesis 13:9). Lot thought things over, saw that the best grazing was on the plain near Sodom and Gomorrah, and chose to go in that direction; Abraham accepted the less productive landscape.

How is Abraham an example of generosity? By rights, first choice for prime grazing should have been his. But Abraham allowed Lot to have first choice; God had already blessed Abraham with plenty, and he trusted God to keep on caring for him, even if he didn’t have the best pasturage for his herd. Abraham was more concerned that Lot did well, and be able to support his own growing family.

We live in a dark and evil world. Jesus came among us to drive back the darkness with the light of His love. We help drive back the darkness of evil when we are generous with the good things that God has given us.