Are You A Cheerful Giver?
Many years ago a friend of mine was injured at work and eventually placed on disability. Because of the financial strain this placed on his family, he was forced to sell the farmhouse where they had lived in for many years. He was saddened by the idea of leaving his home, but trusted the Lord for direction. While discussing his pending move one day over lunch, I expressed my disappointment that his family had to move. My friend listened graciously to my concern, then shocked me when he said that leaving the house wasn’t the worst part. He told me that what he was going to miss the most was their prayer counter. This was the place where his family had seen God provide for their needs time and time again.
Through their times of family prayer at this kitchen counter, God had worked marvelously in their lives. On one such occasion, his family was praying for a very specific need. After they concluded their prayer time, they noticed a truck they didn’t recognize coming up the lane. Because of my friend’s injury, he had not been able to properly prepare for the coming winter, leaving them uncertain as to how they would manage the looming New England cold. But God is faithful, and provided for their most pressing need in an unexpected way when a person he didn’t know barreled down his driveway with a large load of firewood—exactly what they had just asked the Lord to provide.
By God’s grace and abundant provisions, very few of us have faced situations like my friend’s. Truth is, we typically live in abundance, and very rarely find ourselves in genuine need of God providing something miraculously. But in our abundance, we bear a very specific responsibility. God has not called us to hoard our resources but to generously share them with those in need. We may have never been like my friend praying for firewood, but we most likely have been in the position of the man with the truckload of firewood. The question is, what would you have done if you were the one with the means to meet my friend’s need?
Proverbs 19:17 teaches “whoever is generous to the poor lends to the LORD, and he will repay him for his deed.” According to this verse, individuals who show pity (i.e., compassion) on those in genuine need will be rewarded for their generosity. This doesn’t mean that for every dollar we give God will immediately pay us back. It’s not teaching that when we give a cord of wood to someone we will receive a cord or more in return. What we do know is that God rewards our generosity, and sometimes this is only seen in our heavenly rewards. In a figurative sense, our compassion and generosity places God in our debt. Bible scholar Tremper Longman writes, “To give to the poor is like a loan to God himself, who will reward those who do it.”[1] God does not promise paybacks, but he does promise faithful reward for acts of generosity.
Throughout the pages of Scripture, God calls his people to be contributors, not consumers. Too many Christians live like spiritual consumers rather than sacrificial contributors. Many believers expect churches to meet their every need, and provide exactly what they want in the way they want in the timing they want. The church and its ministries quickly become a product to be consumed rather than a place where Christians serve one another. The church does not exist for Christians to receive everything they want but for the world to hear the life-changing message of the gospel through the people of God faithfully serving in a local congregation of believers.
During the course of Paul’s interaction with the church at Corinth in 1 and 2 Corinthians, he addresses the thorny subject of money in several passages. In 1 Corinthians 16 and 2 Corinthians 8-9, Paul writes about the Corinthians’ responsibility to financially contribute to the kingdom of God and to gospel ministry. In both letters to the Corinthians, Paul is careful to avoid misunderstandings, criticism, and false accusations (e.g., that he had manipulated them to give or that he was ever suspected of misappropriation of funds). In 1 Corinthians 8:16-24, Paul was careful to set forth safeguards that would prevent mishandling of the collected funds or even an accusation of such improprieties. Paul’s approach to giving was passionate and methodical. He wanted the church’s collection for the saints (i.e., Christians) living in Jerusalem to go smoothly, and he encouraged the Corinthians to give generously to those facing financial hardship. Paul shows great wisdom in these texts; wisdom we would all be prudent to employ.
Think for a moment about the most generous person you know. How does that individual specifically demonstrate the biblical perspective of generosity? Is God impressing upon your heart the need to be more generous? I’m guessing that the majority of us would say that we have room to grow when it comes to generosity. If we’re not careful, we can quickly construct a mental radar system that warns us when we are about to be asked for money or some other form of assistance. Parting with money, time, provisions, and even old clothes can prove to be difficult, but Jesus expects more of us. He has unapologetically called us to be generous contributors—not selfish consumers.
During his earthly ministry, Jesus often spoke about money. How we handle our financial resources means a great deal to the Lord because our money always follows our priorities. One of the most familiar passages on sacrificial giving is found in the twenty-first chapter of Luke’s Gospel.
Jesus looked up and saw the rich putting their gifts into the offering box, and he saw a poor widow put in two small copper coins. And he said, “Truly, I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all of them. For they all contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty put in all she had to live on” (vv. 1-4).
In this text, the wealthy are contrasted with a poor and needy widow who is only able to offer the smallest coin in circulation at that time. These coins were worth approximately 1/8th of a penny; it represented one one-hundredth of an average day’s wage. Not much money to be sure. The temple treasury, like in most churches today, was primarily funded by the wealthy. It would have been highly unusual to see a poor widow giving from her meager possessions. Her meager gift hardly made a dent in the temple budgetary needs, but it didn’t go unnoticed. It would be like tossing a couple of pennies you found on the sidewalk in the offering—basically worthless. But this widow genuinely sacrificed out of her poverty from a desire to be a faithful contributor to God’s work, and Jesus praised her for her sacrifice. This poor widow’s gift was so small it’s hardly worth noticing, but Jesus commends this woman’s gift over the larger sums of money given by the wealthy because she had so little to give (vv. 3-4). She gave substantially beyond what common sense and self-preservation would have suggested she give. After the donation of the rich man he was still rich, but the widow was left with nothing.
Luke’s account of Jesus and the poor widow is not the only place in the New Testament where we find an example of such sacrificial giving. We see a similar dynamic in Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians where he writes:
Now, brethren, we wish to make known to you the grace of God which has been given in the churches of Macedonia, that in a great ordeal of affliction their abundance of joy and their deep poverty overflowed in the wealth of their liberality. For I testify that according to their ability, and beyond their ability they gave of their own accord (8:1-3).
Once again, we see believers giving beyond their means for the purpose of ministry. Sure, we are to be good stewards of our money and care for our own families first. But if we’re honest, we could all stand to be a little more generous. God did not create us to be takers. He created us to be givers.
A pastor friend of mine once told me about a dark time in his ministry—one that left him woefully discouraged and defeated. The church where he pastored at the time was starting a Christian school, and was in the process of constructing the building that would house the school. As so often happens in building projects, they were running way over budget, and eventually ran out of money with only the exterior walls and roof finished. They had no more money to finish the inside, leaving them to wonder how they would ever complete the building in time.
My pastor friend told me that one night he was walking through the incomplete building throwing himself a good old fashioned pity party. With nothing left to do but pray, that’s what he chose to do. While walking through this unfinished school begging the Lord to provide the necessary funds, a longtime friend of his showed up unannounced. This man found my friend wandering through what was to be the classrooms, overcome with despair. My friend asked the man what he was doing there. The man answered that he wasn’t really sure. All he knew was that the Lord had laid my friend’s ministry on his heart, so he drove several hours to check in on my friend.
The surprise visitor asked if there was a specific need that the ministry had, and my friend unwaveringly told him that they needed to raise a specific sum of money to finish the school building. The man laughed, and said, “Now I know why I’m here.” He went on to explain that he had a sum of money that he wanted to donate to a ministry, and as you can probably guess—the man’s amount was exactly what my friend’s church needed to finish the building project. Thanks to this man’s generous gift that school is still in operation today, and he will reap the reward of his generosity in God’s kingdom.
God wants you to be a contributor, not a consumer. He expects all of us to contribute to his work. Generosity is not always easy, but our heavenly Father expects his children to be charitable. As Christians, we can give generously because we know that God will take care of us, and reward us for our sacrifice.
I came across a little story somewhere along the way and came across it again while writing this article. The story is about a mother who wanted to teach her daughter the joy of giving. To teach the little girl the lesson, the mother gave her both a quarter and a dollar to take to church one Sunday morning. She told her daughter that she could put in either one; the choice was hers. As they were leaving church after the service, the mother asked her daughter what she ended up giving to the Lord. The little girl replied, “I was going to give the dollar, but just before the offering, the man in the pulpit said we should be cheerful givers. I knew I would be a lot more cheerful if I just gave the quarter.”
There is a lot of this little girl in most of us. We wrongly believe that giving the least will bring us joy. But it doesn’t. We need to ask God to change our hearts, and show us the blessing of generosity. I urge you to generously contribute to God’s work, and experience the rich blessings of faithful giving.
[1] Tremper Longman III, Proverbs (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2006), 369.
Through their times of family prayer at this kitchen counter, God had worked marvelously in their lives. On one such occasion, his family was praying for a very specific need. After they concluded their prayer time, they noticed a truck they didn’t recognize coming up the lane. Because of my friend’s injury, he had not been able to properly prepare for the coming winter, leaving them uncertain as to how they would manage the looming New England cold. But God is faithful, and provided for their most pressing need in an unexpected way when a person he didn’t know barreled down his driveway with a large load of firewood—exactly what they had just asked the Lord to provide.
By God’s grace and abundant provisions, very few of us have faced situations like my friend’s. Truth is, we typically live in abundance, and very rarely find ourselves in genuine need of God providing something miraculously. But in our abundance, we bear a very specific responsibility. God has not called us to hoard our resources but to generously share them with those in need. We may have never been like my friend praying for firewood, but we most likely have been in the position of the man with the truckload of firewood. The question is, what would you have done if you were the one with the means to meet my friend’s need?
Proverbs 19:17 teaches “whoever is generous to the poor lends to the LORD, and he will repay him for his deed.” According to this verse, individuals who show pity (i.e., compassion) on those in genuine need will be rewarded for their generosity. This doesn’t mean that for every dollar we give God will immediately pay us back. It’s not teaching that when we give a cord of wood to someone we will receive a cord or more in return. What we do know is that God rewards our generosity, and sometimes this is only seen in our heavenly rewards. In a figurative sense, our compassion and generosity places God in our debt. Bible scholar Tremper Longman writes, “To give to the poor is like a loan to God himself, who will reward those who do it.”[1] God does not promise paybacks, but he does promise faithful reward for acts of generosity.
Throughout the pages of Scripture, God calls his people to be contributors, not consumers. Too many Christians live like spiritual consumers rather than sacrificial contributors. Many believers expect churches to meet their every need, and provide exactly what they want in the way they want in the timing they want. The church and its ministries quickly become a product to be consumed rather than a place where Christians serve one another. The church does not exist for Christians to receive everything they want but for the world to hear the life-changing message of the gospel through the people of God faithfully serving in a local congregation of believers.
During the course of Paul’s interaction with the church at Corinth in 1 and 2 Corinthians, he addresses the thorny subject of money in several passages. In 1 Corinthians 16 and 2 Corinthians 8-9, Paul writes about the Corinthians’ responsibility to financially contribute to the kingdom of God and to gospel ministry. In both letters to the Corinthians, Paul is careful to avoid misunderstandings, criticism, and false accusations (e.g., that he had manipulated them to give or that he was ever suspected of misappropriation of funds). In 1 Corinthians 8:16-24, Paul was careful to set forth safeguards that would prevent mishandling of the collected funds or even an accusation of such improprieties. Paul’s approach to giving was passionate and methodical. He wanted the church’s collection for the saints (i.e., Christians) living in Jerusalem to go smoothly, and he encouraged the Corinthians to give generously to those facing financial hardship. Paul shows great wisdom in these texts; wisdom we would all be prudent to employ.
Think for a moment about the most generous person you know. How does that individual specifically demonstrate the biblical perspective of generosity? Is God impressing upon your heart the need to be more generous? I’m guessing that the majority of us would say that we have room to grow when it comes to generosity. If we’re not careful, we can quickly construct a mental radar system that warns us when we are about to be asked for money or some other form of assistance. Parting with money, time, provisions, and even old clothes can prove to be difficult, but Jesus expects more of us. He has unapologetically called us to be generous contributors—not selfish consumers.
During his earthly ministry, Jesus often spoke about money. How we handle our financial resources means a great deal to the Lord because our money always follows our priorities. One of the most familiar passages on sacrificial giving is found in the twenty-first chapter of Luke’s Gospel.
Jesus looked up and saw the rich putting their gifts into the offering box, and he saw a poor widow put in two small copper coins. And he said, “Truly, I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all of them. For they all contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty put in all she had to live on” (vv. 1-4).
In this text, the wealthy are contrasted with a poor and needy widow who is only able to offer the smallest coin in circulation at that time. These coins were worth approximately 1/8th of a penny; it represented one one-hundredth of an average day’s wage. Not much money to be sure. The temple treasury, like in most churches today, was primarily funded by the wealthy. It would have been highly unusual to see a poor widow giving from her meager possessions. Her meager gift hardly made a dent in the temple budgetary needs, but it didn’t go unnoticed. It would be like tossing a couple of pennies you found on the sidewalk in the offering—basically worthless. But this widow genuinely sacrificed out of her poverty from a desire to be a faithful contributor to God’s work, and Jesus praised her for her sacrifice. This poor widow’s gift was so small it’s hardly worth noticing, but Jesus commends this woman’s gift over the larger sums of money given by the wealthy because she had so little to give (vv. 3-4). She gave substantially beyond what common sense and self-preservation would have suggested she give. After the donation of the rich man he was still rich, but the widow was left with nothing.
Luke’s account of Jesus and the poor widow is not the only place in the New Testament where we find an example of such sacrificial giving. We see a similar dynamic in Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians where he writes:
Now, brethren, we wish to make known to you the grace of God which has been given in the churches of Macedonia, that in a great ordeal of affliction their abundance of joy and their deep poverty overflowed in the wealth of their liberality. For I testify that according to their ability, and beyond their ability they gave of their own accord (8:1-3).
Once again, we see believers giving beyond their means for the purpose of ministry. Sure, we are to be good stewards of our money and care for our own families first. But if we’re honest, we could all stand to be a little more generous. God did not create us to be takers. He created us to be givers.
A pastor friend of mine once told me about a dark time in his ministry—one that left him woefully discouraged and defeated. The church where he pastored at the time was starting a Christian school, and was in the process of constructing the building that would house the school. As so often happens in building projects, they were running way over budget, and eventually ran out of money with only the exterior walls and roof finished. They had no more money to finish the inside, leaving them to wonder how they would ever complete the building in time.
My pastor friend told me that one night he was walking through the incomplete building throwing himself a good old fashioned pity party. With nothing left to do but pray, that’s what he chose to do. While walking through this unfinished school begging the Lord to provide the necessary funds, a longtime friend of his showed up unannounced. This man found my friend wandering through what was to be the classrooms, overcome with despair. My friend asked the man what he was doing there. The man answered that he wasn’t really sure. All he knew was that the Lord had laid my friend’s ministry on his heart, so he drove several hours to check in on my friend.
The surprise visitor asked if there was a specific need that the ministry had, and my friend unwaveringly told him that they needed to raise a specific sum of money to finish the school building. The man laughed, and said, “Now I know why I’m here.” He went on to explain that he had a sum of money that he wanted to donate to a ministry, and as you can probably guess—the man’s amount was exactly what my friend’s church needed to finish the building project. Thanks to this man’s generous gift that school is still in operation today, and he will reap the reward of his generosity in God’s kingdom.
God wants you to be a contributor, not a consumer. He expects all of us to contribute to his work. Generosity is not always easy, but our heavenly Father expects his children to be charitable. As Christians, we can give generously because we know that God will take care of us, and reward us for our sacrifice.
I came across a little story somewhere along the way and came across it again while writing this article. The story is about a mother who wanted to teach her daughter the joy of giving. To teach the little girl the lesson, the mother gave her both a quarter and a dollar to take to church one Sunday morning. She told her daughter that she could put in either one; the choice was hers. As they were leaving church after the service, the mother asked her daughter what she ended up giving to the Lord. The little girl replied, “I was going to give the dollar, but just before the offering, the man in the pulpit said we should be cheerful givers. I knew I would be a lot more cheerful if I just gave the quarter.”
There is a lot of this little girl in most of us. We wrongly believe that giving the least will bring us joy. But it doesn’t. We need to ask God to change our hearts, and show us the blessing of generosity. I urge you to generously contribute to God’s work, and experience the rich blessings of faithful giving.
[1] Tremper Longman III, Proverbs (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2006), 369.
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