Meditations

“As every good thing, every grace, flows from the generosity of our Creator and Redeemer, may He be constantly blessed and praised for it all, and may it please Him each day to open more widely the fountain of His graciousness in order thus to increase and carry forward what He has begun in your minds and hearts.

I have no doubt that God’s generosity and love will indeed bring this about. The supreme generosity of God is so supremely eager to spread it’s own riches…if only we for ours have a humility and desire capacious enough to receive His graces and if only He can see us using well the gifts we have received, and asking eagerly and lovingly for His grace.”

Ignatius of Loyola (1491-1556) in a personal letter to Students of the Society of Jesus in Coimbra dated 7 May 1547 from Rome from Personal Writings, ed. Joseph Munition (London: Penguin, 1996).

Last night I said to my wife after a great Cattails neighborhood social, “Who is your favorite saint from church history?” She didn’t even flinch. “Ignatius of Loyola! He taught me the daily examen, and to attune to God’s presence in my life and in the lives of others.” So I did some searching in his private writings and found these words on generosity to students.

This quote resonated with me because of a conversation I had just yesterday with a leader I am mentoring. I said something like this: “Until we learn to receive graciously, we will never give generously.” Ignatius would concur, and He would likely add that it’s God’s love that helps us grasp and live this way. Make it so, Lord Jesus.

“It might seem obvious that generously giving money away involves a loss—of the money itself, of course, and of the goods, experiences, or savings that the money might have provided the giver had it not been given away…Being generous would appear to exact a net cost to the giving person. Generosity should seem to balance out to a relative deficit…Not so. Not at all. The reality of generosity is instead actually paradoxical.

Generosity does not usually work in simple, zero-sum, win-lose ways. Rather than generosity producing net losses, in general, the more generously people give of themselves, the more of many goods they receive in turn. Sometimes they receive more of the same kind of thing that they gave—money, time, attention, and so forth. But, more often and importantly, generous people tend to receive back goods that are often more valuable than those they gave: happiness, health, a sense of purpose in life, and personal growth.”

Christian Smith and Hilary Davidson in The Paradox of Generosity: Giving We Receive, Grasping We Lose (Oxford: OUP, 2014) 1.

As I have been teaching on generosity lately, I have felt moved to remind people that when we give generously in obedience to the teachings of Jesus, we don’t end up empty, we end up enriched. Sure enough, when I revisited this book by Smith and Davidson this morning, I found that they not only support this notion, they demonstrate it’s validity through extensive research.

Why help instead of hoard? Why share instead of storing up treasures on earth? It’s the paradoxical pathway that Jesus has marked out for us, and it will not leave us empty, but rather, enriched.

“Rest in the deep assurance of My unfailing love. Let your body, mind, and spirit relax in My presence. Release into My care anything that is troubling you so that you can focus your full attention on Me. Be awed by the vast dimensions of My love for you: wider, longer, higher, and deeper than anything you know. Rejoice that this marvelous love is yours forever.

The best response to this glorious gift is a life steeped in thankfulness. Every time you thank Me, you acknowledge that I am your Lord and Provider. The is the proper stance for a child of God: receiving with thanksgiving. Bring Me the sacrifice of gratitude and watch to see how much I will bless you (1 Peter 5:7; Ephesians 3:16-19; Psalm 107:21-22)

Sarah Young in Jesus Calling reading for November 28 (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2013).

Jenni and I are profoundly grateful for God’s gift of a getaway to Mott, North Dakota, for the hunting hospitality of John Roswech, the cooking of the Pheasant Café (we ate five meals there) and the privilege of watching Joy, our German Shorthair Pointer, do what God made her to do: hunt pheasant. We are “receiving with thanksgiving” the blessing of this unforgettable time together as we return home to our regular rhythms of life. Thank you God.

“Don’t for a minute think you are remembering the Lord when you have practically forgotten the poor. It’s not the ritual that creates the righteousness, but the righteousness that verifies the ritual.”

J.D. Walt in “What if We Tailgated before Church?” blog post on 5 November 2015 at the Seedbed.com Daily Text.

What binds me so closely to guys like Randy Discher or Josh Roswech is that these guys remember the Lord and the poor. I love that when Peter, James, and John resolved to take the gospel to the Jews and Paul and Barnabas to the Gentiles, both agreed that no matter what, they’d remember the poor. It’s what God’s people do!

James, Peter and John, those esteemed as pillars, gave me and Barnabas the right hand of fellowship when they recognized the grace given to me. They agreed that we should go to the Gentiles, and they to the circumcised. All they asked was that we should continue to remember the poor, the very thing I had been eager to do all along. Galatians 2:9-10

VBS is happening in Guatemala for over 2,000 poor children right now thanks to the work of Potter’s House in Guatemala. Pray about deploying a portion of God’s resources to this great program. I will admit, I especially love this work because Jenni helped launch it and provides ongoing counsel and assistant to it!

“If you injure someone you dislike, you will find yourself disliking him more. If you do him a good turn, you will find yourself disliking him less. There is, indeed, one exception. If you do him a good turn, not to please God and obey the law of charity, but to show him what a fine forgiving chap you are, and to put him in your debt, and then sit down to wait for his “gratitude,” you will probably be disappointed. (People are not fools: they have a very quick eye for anything like showing off, or patronage.) But whenever we do good to another self, just because it is a self, made (like us) by God, and desiring its own happiness as we desire ours, we shall have learned to love it a little more or, at least, to dislike it less.”

C.S. Lewis (1898-1963) in Mere Christianity, excerpt from chapter nine on “Charity”. I chose to read from this classic today because of the simple brilliance of it. Also, it reminds me of my brothers. up here in Mott, North Dakota, who do good to others: John Roswech and Shawn MacFarland.

Yesterday was a great day! We shot pheasant and enjoyed sweet fellowship! One of my favorite parts was watching the dogs work. God made them to find birds, which got me thinking. What did He make, or perhaps now that we are in Christ, what did God “remake” us to do? One word: love.

Lewis calls it the “law of charity” and it is precisely what God remade us to do! A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.” John 13:34-35

“Grace is the good pleasure of God that inclines Him to bestow benefits upon the undeserving. It is a self-existent principle inherent in the divine nature and appears to us as a self-caused propensity to pity the wretched, spare the guilty, welcome the outcast, and bring into favor those who were before under just disapprobation. Its use to us sinful men is to save us and to make us sit together in heavenly places to demonstrate to the ages the exceeding riches of God’s kindness to us in Christ Jesus.”

A. W. Tozer (1897-1963) in Knowledge of the Holy, excerpt from “The Grace of God” section of chapter 19.

I read some from A. W. Tozer today as I’m hunting pheasant with Randy Discher. Tozer is his favorite! When I read this chapter on the grace of God, this section moved me because generosity in the New Testament is rooted in grace.

Most generosity in our culture today is directed to those society says are “deserving” of support. As I give thanks today for the opportunity to enjoy the outdoors, I am also celebrating that God extended His love and kindness to me when I was undeserving.

Here’s a list of seven statements linked to generosity that Ben Geib gleaned from great sermons by John Piper, Randy Alcorn, et al.

1. As the richest people in the world we have two options: Hoard wealth for ourselves or yield wealth and use it for the glory of Christ.
2. Part of Jesus being Lord of our lives is Him being Lord of our money and possessions.
3. When a life is changed it is demonstrated by a changed outlook on money and possessions.
4. Our giving is a response of God’s grace that He gives to us.
5. Giving is the only way to break the back of humanism.
6. We need to incorporate giving accountability
7. The Christian community should be populated by people who set a cap on their lifestyles and give everything beyond that.

Ben Geib, the aspiring theologian in his “Money, Ministry, and the Magnificence of Christ” blog post.

I stumbled on this list while looking for a manuscript by John Piper. What a find! Perfect for a Sunday post! Imagine what it would be like if our churches lived out these statements. Regardless of what others are doing, our family believes that the life set forth in this list is the only way to live!

Today Jenni and I are driving to Mott, North Dakota, with our German Shorthair Pointer, Joy. We will reconnect with John Roswech, a NY/NJ executive we met while serving at Potter’s House in Guatemala. Randy and Debbie Discher, dear friends from Minnesota will also join us. May God grant us safe travel, fruitful pheasant hunting, and sweet fellowship.

“The Spirit is the giver of all life, and hence all work, as an expression of human life, draws its energy out of the fullness of the divine Spirit’s energy. When human beings work, they work only because God’s Spirit has given them power and talent to work. Without God’s preserving and sustaining grace, no work would be possible.”

Miroslav Volf in Work in the Spirit: Toward a Theology of Work (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991) 121.

We are wrapping up our Faith and Work meetings this morning in Minneapolis, and then I am heading home. I pray that as a result of these discussions, the attendees see work as a gift from God that is preserved and sustained by Him. When workers live in this reality, work becomes worship and another avenue in which we can each reflect God’s generosity.

“Out of more than a score of great civilizations in human history, modern Western civilization is the very first to have no agreed-on answer to the question of the purpose of life. Thus more ignorance, confusion—and longing—surround this topic now than at almost any time in history.

The trouble is that, as modern people, we have too much to live with and too little to live for. Some feel they have time but not enough money; others feel they have money but not enough time. But for most of us, in the midst of material plenty, we have spiritual poverty.”

Os Guinness in The Call: Finding and Fulfilling the Central Purpose of Your Life (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2003) 4. This is one of great books that surfaces in the Faith and Work conversations.

Does the picture Guinness paints sound familiar?

This is precisely why we must help people hear “the call” that life is found in a job, its found in Jesus. Then and only then will people get on the pathway that leads to spiritual plenty on which they are transformed into conduits of divine generosity.

Pray for God’s blessings on today’s meetings with 25 EFCA pastors and 25 lay leaders as we explore together the topic of the integration of faith and work.

“God loves a generous giver and He can’t be outdone in generosity. Consider using money as one way of investing in others rather than ourselves—this can be an antidote to the rampant materialism that surrounds us. After all, how can worldly trinkets compare to treasures of heaven?”

Kevin Lowry in Faith at Work: Purpose beyond the Paycheck (Huntington: Our Sunday Visitor, 2012) 29.

Last night I returned home from New Hampshire, and I am off to Minneapolis today to meet with another gathering of pastors to consider faith and work in God’s economy. Thanks for your prayers in this busy season of travel.

At the core of our discussions, many follow the world’s prevailing thinking that the purpose of work is to make money. When followers of Christ integrate their faith and work, work moves beyond merely remuneration (“I work to make money”) to contribution (“I use my gifts to serve others”) and reflection (“I work to glorify God”).

As the year-end shopping and giving seasons enter full swing, let’s do our work not to make money to buy things but focus on glorifying God by serving and investing in others rather than spending on ourselves. Ask God to guide you as to how you should deploy yourself and His resources the year-end.