Recently I have been studying a little about Christian Stewardship and have been driven toward a single verse. It seems appropriate at Thanksgiving, but the verse is 2 Corinthians 9:7;
“Each of you should give what you have decided in your heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.”
Somehow that just shakes me up! Can you see that it is not a command or a requirement; we are given complete freedom yet we are reminded that by being generous from the heart, being cheerfully generous is a true testimony of faith in Jesus? I just had to dig a little deeper and I looked up the Greek words for Cheerful Giver.
In Greek the word Cheerful is Hilaros – which means joyous and prompt to do anything and the word Giver is Dotes which literally means giver (ha – I couldn’t resist). But if you put it together what we are told is that God loves someone that is so joyous that they promptly give.
It reminds me of the people Pastor Francis Chan describes in his book; Crazy Love; people that are so radically transformed by the radical love of Jesus that they give in radical ways. It is a call to really come to terms with just how generous our loving God has been with us and that in turn we can honor him out of loving gratitude by being cheerful givers.
Some time back I read a story that Charles Swindoll tells; it is the story of a soldier in WWII and an orphan and it was shortly after World War II came to a close, Europe began picking up the pieces. Much of the Old Country had been ravaged by war and was in ruins. Perhaps the saddest sight of all was that of little orphaned children starving in the streets of those war-torn cities. Early on chilly morning an American soldier was making his way back to the barracks in London. As he turned the corner in his jeep, he spotted a kid with his nose pressed to the window of a pastry shop. Inside the cook was kneading dough for a fresh batch of doughnuts. The hungry boy stared in silence, watching every move. The soldier pulled his jeep to the curb, stopped, got out and walked quietly over to where the young man was standing. Through the steamed-up window he could see the mouth-watering morsels as they were being pulled from the over, piping hot. The boy salivated and released a slight groan as he watched the cook place them onto the glass-enclosed counter ever so carefully. The soldier’s heart went out to the nameless orphan as he stood beside him. “Son...would you like some of those?” The boy was startled. “Oh, yeah...I would!” The American stepped inside and bought a dozen, put them in a bag, and walked back to where the boy was standing in the foggy cold of the London morning. He smiled, held out the bag, and said simply: “Here you are.” As he turned to walk away, he felt a tug on his coat. He looked back and heard the child ask quietly: “Mister ... are you God?”
Oh my, can you see that we are never more like God than when we give.
Friends beginning this Thanksgiving may we be transformed and truly understand the radical Generosity of God; may we begin to be radically generous with a world that so desperately needs it; may we all be cheerful givers.
Grace and Peace!
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