THE GOD WHO GIVES

The sleep of the laborer is pleasant—whether he eats little or much— but the wealth of the rich will not allow him to sleep. Ecclesiastes 5:12 (NET)

How often is it that we worry about losing what he have? Or worry about not attaining to our goals and dreams?

When I was in year 10, I went to Thailand with my school. While we were there, we visited the same orphanage each day or so, and were paired up with a child during our time there. Mark, was the child that I got to share some time with. Though he didn’t have many possessions or live with his parents, he seemed like a happy kid. The last time that we visited, we brought some gifts for them. I gave him some lollies with mine. I was humble when he wanted to share them with me. If roles were reversed, I feel that I would have kept them for later when I could eat them myself…

My point in sharing this is not to say we should have less things, but to ask if our abundance is keeping us from appreciating what we do have. Does our fear of losing it keep us up at night?

God has made humanity ‘in his image’. This reveals to us the generosity of God. He made us to be, in many senses, just like him! Taken simply, God made us to be generous towards others, which imitates his generosity to us.

In the gospel of Matthew, Jesus teaches about those who will be blessed. One of these are called, the ‘meek’. A strange word, which could be described as this: Those who are content with what they have, so, instead of trying to use what they have to get ahead of others, they are willing to use it for the benefit of other people.

Let’s consider the extent of God’s generosity: God was generous to the point that he was willing to send Jesus to us. Emmanuel. God with us. He could give us no greater gift.

Maybe, as we head into Christmas, instead of thinking about what we might receive, we could ask ourselves these things instead:

• What is it that God has given me, which I may not be appreciating just yet?

• What needs to happen so that I can appreciate more deeply the things that God has given me?

• What do I have that I can use to be generous towards somebody else?

Contentment and generosity help us to love other people more than money and possessions. Just like God loves us.