Theophan the Recluse: Sobriety precedes generosity

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Theophan the Recluse: Sobriety precedes generosity

“To be sober means not to let the heart cling to anything accept God. Cleaving to other things makes the soul drunk, and it begins to do quite unaccountable things. To be vigilant means to watch carefully, lest something evil springs up in the heart.”

Theophan the Recluse (1815-1894) in The Fruits of Prayer as cited in The Quotable Saint ed. Rosemary Ellen Guiley (New York: Visionary Living, 2002) 118.

Numerous Scriptures call us as saints to sobriety. Few saints explain what it means to be sober better than the Russian bishop, Theophan. With vigilance I echo his charge: let us watch that our hearts cling to nothing but God, for I believe such sobriety precedes generosity as it helps us be sure our hearts are right. Want your heart right? Stay sober!

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Sacred Heart: Why pray for Christian Generosity?

“There are many reasons why we should pray for Christian generosity. First of all it is something heroic, and nothing heroic can be had without prayer. Then it is something very rare; it’s opposite–meanness–is common, but it is altogether exceptional. Necessary at all times, it was rarely more needed than it is in our time; without it Christian life is impossible and religion must perish.”

The Message of the Sacred Heart article entitled “Christian Generosity” October (1901) 937-938.

As I continue to explore the heart of generosity, I was moved by this article written over 100 years old urging God’s people to pray for generosity. That’s my prayer today, because I concur: without it the Christian life is impossible!

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Oswald Chambers: May our generosity be God-like

“Our Lord’s exhortation to us in Matthew 5:38-48 is to be generous in our behavior toward everyone…The example our Lord gave us here is not that of a good person, or even of a good Christian, but of God Himself. “. . . be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect.” In other words, simply show to the other person what God has shown to you. And God will give you plenty of real life opportunities…

The true expression of Christian character is not in good-doing, but in God-likeness. If the Spirit of God has transformed you within, you will exhibit divine characteristics in your life, not just good human characteristics. God’s life in us expresses itself as God’s life, not as human life trying to be godly. The secret of a Christian’s life is that the supernatural becomes natural in him [or her] as a result of the grace of God, and the experience of this becomes evident in the practical, everyday details of life…”

Oswald Chambers in My Utmost for His Highest reading for 20 September.

On this Labor Day (and every day) may our generosity not be good-doing but God-like because it is the fruit of His grace at work in each of our hearts and lives.

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Jonathan Edwards: Generosity not rooted in love of God is defective

Schemes of religion or moral philosophy, which, however well in some respects they may treat of benevolence to mankind, and other virtues depending on it, yet have not a supreme regard to God, and love to him, laid in the foundation and all other virtues handled in a connection with this, and in a subordination to this, are no true schemes of philosophy, but are fundamentally and essentially defective.

And whatever other benevolence or generosity towards mankind, and other virtues or moral qualifications which go by that name, any are possessed of that are not attended with a love of God, which is altogether above them, and to which they are subordinate, and on which they are dependent, there is nothing of the nature of true virtue or religion in them.

And it may be asserted in general that nothing is of the nature of true virtue, in which God is not the first and the last; or which, with regard to their exercises in general, have not their first foundation and source in apprehensions of God’s supreme dignity and glory, and in answerable esteem and love of him, and have not respect to God as the supreme end…”

Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758) in “The Nature of True Virtue,” excerpt from Chapter III in A Jonathan Edwards Reader ed. John E. Smith, Harry S. Stout, and Kenneth P. Minkema (Yale University Press, 1995) 258.

May each of us focus not on generosity but rather on love of God, and let our generosity flow from there.

May we not focus on service in our church but rather on love of God and out of that love service in our church. May we not focus on feeding the poor but rather on love of God and out of that love feed the poor. May we not focus on freeing people from human trafficking but rather on love of God and out of that love set captives free.

Edwards is spot on to argue that all benevolence not rooted in love of God is at the heart, defective. This leads me to meditate on 1 Corinthians 13 this morning, and to pray that love of God be the motivation and inspiration from which our generosity flows today and every day.

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Craig T. Kocher: Chaplains inspire generous faith

“Inspiring Generous Faith. I want to share with you why I’ve chosen these particular words for the role of the chaplaincy…

I use the word “inspiring” because too often religious leaders have coerced, pushed, prescribed and dictated what faith should be. My hope is that the chaplaincy will be a place that inspires through thoughtful gestures and tender friendships, that meets [people] where they are, walks beside them to where they are going, and helps guide them on a journey of reflection and discovery.

I use the word “generous” because too often people of faith are not generous, but are rather judgmental, mean-spirited, and moralistic instead of kind, compassionate, and inviting. My hope is that the chaplaincy will be a place that models a generous faith, one that welcomes and includes, invites and shares, and seeks the experience and wisdom present in all spheres of our common life.

And I use the word “faith” because the role of the chaplaincy is not merely to affirm common goodwill, or uphold socially acceptable values, or lend its voice to ethical reflection — though all may be a part of the role. The chaplaincy is here to inspire faith…”

Craig T. Kocher in Faith & Leadership blogpost 9 November 2009.

I am sending today’s meditation from White Sulphur Springs, the Officer’s Christian Fellowship Eastern Conference Center, in Central Pennsylvania. I am the weekend retreat speaker for a group of Air Force chaplains and leaders. My prayer is to bless and inspire generous faith in them.

In seven teaching and discussion sessions I am excited that this group of military leaders asked me to lead them through my recent book, The Choice: The Christ-Centered Pursuit of Kingdom Outcomes. I’d appreciate your prayers for a Spirit-filled weekend that stirs a great awakening in many hearts.

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Andrew Murray: Christ wants generous love

“The world looks at the money and its amount; Christ, at the man and his motive.

You see this in the story of the poor widow. Many that were rich cast in much, but it was out of their abundance. There was no real sacrifice in it; their life was as full and comfortable as ever – it cost them nothing. There was no special love or devotion to God in their giving, only part of an easy and traditional religion. The widow cast in a farthing. Out of her want she cast in all that she had, even all her living. She gave all to God without reserve, without holding back anything. She gave all.

How different our standard is from Christ’s. We ask how much a man gives. Christ asks how much he keeps. We look at the gift. Christ asks whether the gift was a sacrifice. The widow kept nothing over – she gave all. And the gift won His heart and approval, for it was in the spirit of His own self-sacrifice, who, being rich, became poor for our own sakes. They, out of their abundance, cast in much; she, out of her want, all that she had. But if our Lord wanted us to do as she did, why did He not leave a clear command? How gladly then would we do it.

Ah! There you have it. You want a command to make you do it. That would just be the spirit of the world in the church looking at what we give, at our giving all. And that is just what Christ does not wish and will not have. He wants the generous love that gives unbidden. He wants every gift to be a gift warm and bright with love, a true free-will offering. If you want the Master’s approval as the poor widow had it, remember one thing: you must put all at His feet, hold all at His disposal. And that, as the spontaneous expression of a love that, like Mary’s, cannot help giving, just because it loves.

All my money-giving – what a test of character! Lord Jesus! Oh give me grace to love you intently that I may know how to give.”

Andrew Murray (1828-1917) in Christ’s Perspective on the Use and Abuse of Money (Minneapolis: Bethany Fellowship, 1978) 11-13.

Since the heart is what Christ cares about let us explore this vital area further in the days to come. Indeed, God give us grace to love you intently that we may know how to give.

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C.S. Lewis: What the Father values in our gifts

“All our offerings, whether of music or martyrdom, are like the intrinsically worthless present of a child, which a father values indeed, but values only for the intention.”

C.S. Lewis (1898-1963) in Christian Reflections reading “On Church Music” (1949) 99.

Man looks at the size and amount of our gifts, and God looks at our hearts. May this truth inspire each of us be found with childlike hearts full of love, complete trust, and humble gratitude.

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James MacKnight: Jesus wept

A friend challenged me recently to reflect on the generosity of Jesus in this simple, yet profound verse: Jesus wept. John 11:35. His throwdown became a gift to me, for it drove me to mine the depths of this moment. In my reading, I came upon these comments from an 18th century Scottish commentator, James MacKnight. They stirred me. So for the shortest verse in the Bible I offer what may be the longest meditation ever. I pray all who read it will be moved deeply to worship Jesus and perhaps even weep in response.

“Jesus wept. In this grief of the Son of God, there was a greatness and generosity, not to say an amiableness of disposition, infinitely nobler than that which the stoic philosophers aimed at…

By his weeping, they were all convinced that he loved Lazarus exceedingly. Some of them, however, interpreted this circumstance to his disadvantage; for, according to their mean way of judging, they fancied that he had suffered him to fall under the stroke of death, for no other reason but want of power to rescue him. And thinking the miracle, said to have been worked on the blind man during the feast of tabernacles, at least as difficult as the curing of an acute distemper, they called the former in question because the latter had been neglected. If, said they, he has really opened the eyes of the blind, might he not have preserved this man from death?

By all the wonderful works which Jesus had done, these stubborn people were not persuaded, neither would they be convinced by the great miracle he was about to perform. They were to see him raise one to life and health again, that had lain four days in the grave. Yet so hard were their hearts, that many of them would persist in their infidelity still. Jesus, who knew the discourses which they now held among themselves in private concerning him, was likewise fully acquainted with the hardness of their hearts, and at the same time foresaw the miseries which their unbelief would involve them in…

On many occasions, Jesus had publicly appealed to his own miracles as the proofs of his mission; but he did not ordinarily make a formal address to his Father before he worked them; though to have done so, would have showed from whence he derived his authority. Nevertheless, being about to raise Lazarus from the dead, he prayed for his resurrection, to make the persons present sensible that in working his miracles he acted by the assistance, not of devils, as his enemies maliciously affirmed, but of God; and that this miracle in particular, could not be effected without an immediate interposition of the Divine power. The evangelist, it is true, does not say directly either that Jesus prayed, or that he prayed for this end. But the thanksgiving which he tells us he offered up, implies both…

Father, I thank you that you have heard me. I knew that you always hear me, but I said this for the benefit of the people standing here, that they may believe that you sent me. John 11:41b-42

By this prayer and thanksgiving, therefore, Jesus has insinuated, that his own resurrection from the dead is an infallible proof of his divine mission; no power inferior to God’s being able to accomplish a thing of this kind. The dead man heard the voice of the Son of God, and came forth immediately…

Considering the nature and circumstances of this great miracle, it ought to have silenced the peevishness of caviling, might have overcome the obstinacy of prejudice, and should have put to shame the impudence of malice. Wherefore, we cannot help being surprised to find, that the cry, “Lazarus, come forth,” did not produce, on all the people present, an effect some way similar to that which it had on Lazarus. It raised him from the natural death, and might have raised the stupidest of the spectators, from the spiritual, by working in them the living principle of faith.

Every reader must be sensible, that there is something incomparably beautiful in the whole of our Lord’s behavior on this occasion.

After having given such an astonishing instance of his power, he did not speak one word in his own praise either directly or indirectly. He did not chide the disciples for their unwillingness to accompany him into Judea. He did not rebuke the Jews for having in former instances maliciously detracted from the luster of his miracles, every one of which derived additional credit from this incontestable wonder. He did not say how much they were to blame for persisting in their infidelity, though he well knew what they would do. He did not insinuate, even in the most distant manner, the obligations which Lazarus and his sisters were laid under by this signal favor. He did not upbraid Martha and Mary with the discontent they had expressed, at his having delayed to come to the relief of their brother. Nay, he did not so much as put them in mind of the mean notion they had entertained of his power; but always consistent with himself, he was on this, as on every other occasion, a pattern of perfect humility, and absolute self-denial.

A miracle so remarkable, performed in the neighborhood of the capital city, before a multitude of spectators, many of them enemies, could not but make a great noise, and upon different persons must have had very different effects…

The greatest part of the witnesses present at the miracle, when they had seen it, believed Jesus to be Messiah. So incontestable a proof of his power and authority left them no room to doubt of his character. They knew that no impostor could perform any miracle; and so great a one as the resurrection of a person who had been in the grave four days, was a miracle worthy of Messiah himself. Willing therefore to know the truth, they yielded to the force of this evidence. Nevertheless, others of the eye-witnesses being ill-disposed and prejudiced, remained in their unbelief still, and departed as firmly resolved to oppose Jesus as ever.”

James MacKnight (1721-1800) in A Harmony of the Four Gospels (London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orme, Paternoster-Row, 1809) 532-535.

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Kent Hughes: Generosity is a sign

“Generosity is a sign of a regenerate soul.”

Kent Hughes, former pastor of College Church in Wheaton, IL, as recounted by David Mathis in Desiring God blogpost dated 22 August 2014.

Even as construction signs are bright orange and school zones signs are yellow, may God’s work reflected in rich generosity be obvious in your life and mine today (cf. 1 Timothy 5:25).

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Miroslav Volf: Our gift-giving God is no Santa Claus

“We want God to be our heavenly Santa Claus…Santa gives. He doesn’t lay down any conditions prior to giving the gifts, even if parents lamely try to warn little imps that Santa gives only to good boys and girls. After dispensing his gifts, Santa makes no demands…

Some scholars of popular religion describe Santa as a god of consumerist materialism whose sole purpose is to give. And indeed, many people think of God in this way, as Santa Claus conveniently enlarged to divine proportions. God is an infinitely rich, always available, and unfailingly generous giver—or at least, that’s what we feel a god worth of divinity ought to be. God gives without conditions and without demands. As the sun shines and spring flows, so God gives—solves our problems, fulfills our desires, and makes us feel good. A Santa Claus God demands nothing from us. A divine Santa is the indiscriminately giving and inexhaustibly fertile source of everything that is, and everything that is to come our way.

God is an inexhaustibly fertile source of everything. But is it true that God demands nothing? If it were true, how could Jesus urge us, as he does in the Sermon on the Mount, to be perfect as God is? Here is what we do as worshipers of a Santa Claus God: We embrace the conviction that God is an infinitely generous source of all good but conveniently forget that we were created in God’s image to be in some significant sense like God—not like God in God’s divinity, for we are human and not divine, but like God “in true righteousness and holiness” (Ephesians 4:24), like God in loving enemies (Matthew 5:44). To live well as a human being is to live in sync with who God is and how God acts…

Unlike Santa, God doesn’t just scatter gifts, smiling in blissful affirmation of who we are and what we do no matter who we happen to be and what we happen to do. God also urges us to do this or not to do that…God’s face twists in the pain of disappointment and even frowns in angry condemnation when we fail to live as we ought, bringing devastation to ourselves as well as to those around us.

God generously gives, so God is not a negotiator of absolute dimensions. God demands, so God is not an infinite Santa Claus. So what is the relation between God’s giving and God’s demanding? In other words, what is the difference between a Santa Claus God and a gift-giving God? The bare-bones answer is this: a Santa Claus God gives simply so we can have and enjoy things; the true God gives so we can become joyful givers and not just self-absorbed receivers. God the giver has made us to be givers and obliges us therefore to give.”

Miroslav Volf in Free of Charge: Giving and Forgiving in a Culture Stripped of Grace (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2005) 26-28.

After my post on 23 August 2014 on the topic of giving and forgiving, Howard Freeman, my dear friend from NYC, reminded me of Volf’s excellent work on the topic cited here. In revisiting this must-read book this morning, I want to remind us to both celebrate and imitate God’s generosity.

As a postscript, my motivation for mentioning Volf’s comments linked to Santa Claus today flow, at least in part, from where we are: settling into our townhouse feels like Christmas! What a gift! And yet, we are not here because we deserved this place or were entitled to it. It’s a gift from the Lord to be enjoyed and shared that positions us to grow as joyful givers.

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