Chapter 1
Christ’ Attitude Towards Giving
Giving
and Rewards: Both
the
Lord and the Apostles taught about the giving principle in various scriptures. Jesus taught about
alms, offerings, tithes and charity. He recommended to give in secrete, with
the right motive, and out of divine love and mercy just the same way God deals
with us when we ask him during our needs. He emphasised that we should give
only because of God who rewards a genuine giver.
Take heed that ye do not your alms
before men, to be seen of them: otherwise ye have no reward of your Father
which is in heaven. Therefore when thou doest thine alms, do not sound a trumpet before
thee, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may
have glory of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward. But when thou
doest alms, let not thy left hand know what
thy right hand doeth: That thine alms may be in secret: and thy Father which seeth in secret himself shall reward thee
openly Matthew
6:1-4.
An
Offering In God’s Hand Is Never A Waste: According to the Lord’s teaching above.
If
your giving attitude is sincerely focused
on the heavenly father alone; it doesn’t matter what would happen later
with what you have given. You already have your reward from God who looks at
the heart. Many people have wounds because they realised they gave to people
who seemed needful but turned out to be carless and ungrateful and others
turned out to be taking advantage of them. And they are almost giving up giving
to anyone else anymore. Even when they give they are so full of complaints
which will in fact limit their blessing from God.
God
is in charge of what we give if he was the reason why we gave: If a
shop attendant sells out a good to a client and then a thief comes and steals
the good from him before the shop attendant, who do you think would be
responsible for the lose?
In
the same way after we sincerely give our gifts to God, it’s then left for him
to judge the misusers. Because we believe we have been motivated by God and
love to do the sacrifice. And since we give these gifts to God and not to man,
we believe God is responsible for anything that happens thereafter with the
gifts offered into his hands.
The
power to give unsparingly: Looking unto God alone when giving
anything out love is a very crucial issue because it will keep us going even
when someone we gave to hurt us so badly or was ungrateful. If our passion to
give is powered by God not people, it will be a very small thing when someone
hurt us because we never gave to them but to our God. Matters become so big
only if we focus on people and not on God.
God
makes no mistakes giving only to good people: If you’re worried that you’ve given to
bad people, you should be encouraged that God doesn’t only give accidentally to
bad people that he taught were good and turned out not to be as good as he
thought…he instead wilfully gives to evil people who mock and blaspheme his
name. This may sound weird as it sounded to me the first time I read this
scripture, but it pleases God to fulfil his perfect righteousness to all men in
this manner so that all may believe his justice. Jesus once related to our neighbour to a
total stranger that was found robbed, beaten and left half dead; A good
Samaritan did to him what a good neighbour would have done Luke
10:25-37
Be
thou perfect as your heavenly father is perfect: Jesus taught that if we indeed be the
children of God we should relate to the ways of God’s giving. Some people
prefer giving to those who are famous, because it makes them feel safer and
probably like they’re taping into a greater anointing. Others feel safe giving
to those they know or their friends. And to most of us we would only give to
those we think are good people. While giving to friends and families, the good
people and those we know sounds safer and reasonable, it’s not necessarily
biblical…
Jesus
amazed the crowd by announcing that perfect giving is not that that we practice
among families and friends, the good people and those we know or love, but
rather towards strangers, bad people, those who hate, despitefully use and
persecute us.
Wow!
What
an amazing phenomena!
To
God this means perfection because there’s no rewards expected among your
enemies and strangers. Firstly because they
don’t care about you and secondly you may never get a chance to meet
those strangers again to supposedly pay you back.
Ye have heard that it hath been
said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy. But I say
unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that
hate you, and pray for them which
despitefully use you,
and persecute you; That ye may be the children of your Father which is in
heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on
the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the
unjust. For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even
the publicans the same? And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than
others? do not even the publicans so? Be
ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect Matthew
5:43-48.
The
reason why God gives to both good and evil people is to mainly prove his
justice to all. When the wicked see that we’re good to them yet we know that
they’re wicked; it gives them an opportunity to prove God’s unconditional love
and justice within us who follow God. That’s God’s perfect principle of true
love. A very big challenge to many that follow Christ especially in this broken
end time selfish Christian lifestyle.
Healing For Broken Givers: Therefore, if you have been broken
because you thought you gave to a wrong person and therefore you have no
heavenly blessing on you, you’re wrong! God doesn’t depend on the act of giving
but the heart in giving.
Many people give and pretty much by the way, but with the wrong heart. It
doesn’t matter whether they’ve given to the right people who seriously needed
that gift so badly, what matters is the heart and the motive. If their motive was not Christ they
have no blessing with Christ.
That’s how simple the lord taught about sincere giving unto him.
It’s
God Who Punishes The Greedy and Misusers: We’ve read the story of the sons of Eli
how they treated God’s offerings, and God dealt with them very harshly
according to their evil deeds…
Now the sons of Eli were sons of
Belial; they knew not the Lord. And the priest's custom with the people
was, that, when any man offered sacrifice, the priest's servant came, while the
flesh was in seething, with a fleshhook of three teeth in his hand; And he struck it into the pan, or
kettle, or caldron, or pot; all that the fleshhook brought up the priest took for himself.
So they did in Shiloh unto all the Israelites that came thither. Also before
they burnt the fat, the priest's servant came, and said to the man that
sacrificed, Give flesh to roast for the priest; for he will not have sodden
flesh of thee, but raw. And if any man said unto him, Let them not fail to burn
the fat presently, and then take as much as thy soul desireth; then he would answer him, Nay;
but thou shalt give it me now: and if not, I will take it by force. Wherefore
the sin of the young men was very great before the Lord: for men abhorred the offering of
the Lord. Now Eli was very old, and heard
all that his sons did unto all Israel; and how they lay with the women that
assembled at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation. And he said unto them, Why do ye
such things? for I hear of your evil dealings by all this people. Nay, my sons;
for it is no good report that I hear: ye make the Lord's people to transgress. If one man
sin against another, the judge shall judge him: but if a man sin against
the Lord, who shall intreat for him?
Notwithstanding they hearkened not unto the voice of their father, because
the Lord would slay them. And the
child Samuel grew on, and was in favour both with the Lord, and also with men. And there came a man of God unto
Eli, and said unto him, Thus saith the Lord, Did I plainly appear unto the
house of thy father, when they were in Egypt in Pharaoh's house? And did I
choose him out of all the tribes of Israel to be my priest, to offer upon mine
altar, to burn incense, to wear an ephod before me? and did I give unto the
house of thy father all the offerings made by fire of the children of Israel? Wherefore kick ye at my sacrifice
and at mine offering, which I have commanded in my habitation; and honourest thy sons above me, to make
yourselves fat with the chiefest of all the offerings of Israel my
people? Wherefore the Lord God of Israel saith, I said indeed
that thy house, and the house of thy father, should walk before me for ever:
but now… the Lord saith, Be it far from me; for them
that honour me I will honour, and they that despise me shall be lightly
esteemed. Behold, the days come, that I will cut off thine arm, and the arm of
thy father's house, that there shall not be an old man in thine house. And thou shalt see an enemy in my
habitation, in all the wealth which God shall give Israel: and there shall not
be an old man in thine house for ever. And the man of thine, whom I shall not
cut off from mine altar, shall be to consume thine eyes, and to grieve thine
heart: and all the increase of thine house shall die in the flower of their
age. And this shall be a sign unto thee, that shall come upon thy two sons, on
Hophni and Phinehas; in one day they shall die both of them. And I will raise
me up a faithful priest, that shall do according to that which is in mine heart
and in my mind: and I will build him a sure house; and he shall walk before
mine anointed for ever. And it shall come to pass, that every one that is left
in thine house shall come and crouch to him for a piece of silver and a morsel
of bread, and shall say, Put me, I pray thee, into one of the priests' offices,
that I may eat a piece of bread 1 Samuel
2:12-17, 22-36
God
sees whatever is happening even if he doesn’t take immediate action. We
should never let any abuser give us a reason of excuse not to do what we know
is the right thing if
our deeds are only towards our eternal God alone who also understands the heart
and spiritual motive of our gifts that they’re from love and care for his
people and his work nothing more.
For he that soweth to his flesh
shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of
the Spirit reap life everlasting. And let us not be weary in well doing: for in
due season we shall reap, if we faint not. As we have therefore opportunity,
let us do good unto all men, especially unto them who are of the household of
faith Galatian 6:8-10
The
question here remains: Am
I always giving to God? Am I always sowing to the spirit? Or just always
focusing on earthly gains and people’s appreciations?
We will continue this topic soon
