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Day 4: Generosity
Reading: Matthew 6:3; 2 Corinthians 8:7
(The Voice)
3 When you give to the needy, do it in
secret—even your left hand should not know what your right
hand is doing.
7 Just as you are rich in everything—in
faith and speech, in knowledge and all sincerity, and in the
love we have shown among you[a]—now I ask you to invest richly
in this gracious work too.
The Passion Translation counts 19
occurrences of the word ‘generosity’ in the New Testament (and
a bunch more ‘generous’, ‘generously’, etc.).
We read a study out of University of
Michigan that found that over long periods of time, married
couples grow to look increasingly like each other.
And the happier they are as a couple, the more likely
they will increase physical similarity
(https://www.livescience.com/8384-couples-start.html).
So, as we follow Jesus, it is only (super)natural that
we grow more and more like Him.
It’s kind of the point!
And we’ve learned as we read the Bible
that God is a generous God.
There are scores of verses scattered throughout
Scripture that underline this divine characteristic (google
for yourself) but here’s one – Matthew 7:11 (TPT): “If you,
imperfect as you are, know how to lovingly take care of your
children and give them what’s best, how much more ready is
your heavenly Father to give wonderful gifts to those who
ask.”
One of the dangers with religion is
that we, with good intentions, try to generate side-effects
and major on secondary results.
Generosity is important.
And so sometimes we buckle down and intentionally look
for ways to be generous.
And that’s not a bad thing.
But if you add generosity to a shopping list of
Christian characteristics (veteran Christians will riff on
things like ‘love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness,
faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control’), it gets lost, we
lose focus, then energy, and then motivation (that’s one of
the big problems of religion, but that’s for another time).
Remember the study above – couples that
spend a long time together and are happy grow more alike.
So, as you and Jesus are companions over a long period
of time, and if you are happy together (implies that your
priorities are aligned with His), then you grow more and more
like Him. In
Christian circles we call that being ‘Christ-like’.
And one of the outflows of being
Christ-like is that you are generous as Jesus is generous.
The focus isn’t so much on being generous as it is on
being close to Jesus.
And then generosity will emerge as a character-trait.
Does that make sense?
Then let’s stay close to Jesus.
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